Hogs will rebound against over-matched North Texas

Last week’s fourth-quarter collapse against Colorado State has caused an incredibly huge number of Arkansas fans to jump off the bandwagon before this week’s game against North Texas.

That didn’t take long, did it?

It’s like everything else in life … nothing’s as good as it seems and nothing’s as bad as it seems and reality is somewhere in the middle. That’s not me. Lou Holtz first said it in 1977 after his team suffered it’s only loss of the season against Texas.

Lou also had another saying as the world of college football evolved over the last 40 years that’s especially true now: Different week, different team.

The Mean Green haven’t played anybody that’s any good. There’s SMU that has struggled after Chad Morris left, but they didn’t have any defense when he was there so let’s not debate that a lot.

Then they played Incarnate Word. They are from San Antonio and I’m pretty sure most of you reading this didn’t know that. They are an FCS team in the Southland Conference and they aren’t very good in that league.

No, North Texas has a pretty nifty little quarterback. Arkansas defensive coordinator John Chavis said Monday that Mason Fine can “spin it” with the best.

In reality, Fine might make second team at an SEC school. Well, maybe half of the schools. He’s listed at 5-foot-11, which means if North Texas’ measuring system is like most schools he’s actually 5-9.

Let’s see what he does against an SEC defense, no matter how bad some Razorback fans want to downgrade it.

I’m guessing Chavis and a defense that has a chip on it’s shoulder is going to look better than most people think.

We don’t have a clue who will be the quarterback against North Texas, but I’m still not convinced we won’t see one of the freshmen, despite the fact they weren’t on the depth chart for this game.

It may be a slow first quarter, but the Hogs will take control of this game and this time they won’t blow the lead late.

Arkansas 63, North Texas 24

Last week I was 10-2 bringing me to 22-3 on the season. The Hogs and Florida losing for the first time in 31 years to Kentucky did me in.

Let’s take care of the easy ones first:

Georgia beats Middle Tennessee, Kentucky downs Murray State, Tennessee over UTEP, Notre Dame over Vanderbilt, Florida over Colorado State, Mississippi State over Louisiana and Texas A&M over Louisiana-Monroe.

LSU at -10.5 Auburn

The Tigers will win. Guaranteed.

Okay, bad joke.

LSU comes into this game set up for a kill about as well as any time I’ve seen in awhile. Auburn is still smarting from that second-half meltdown at Tiger Stadium last year and they’ve spent two weeks wanting to erase that memory.

After losing maybe it’s best defensive player last week, this one doesn’t look for LSU.

It’s rare to see a double-digit point spread on two teams ranked as high as they are. Auburn is No. 9 and LSU is No. 12 and it’s a 10.5-point spread.

Auburn 31, LSU 10

Alabama -22.5 at Ole Miss

The Rebels’ faithful will remind you they are the last SEC team to beat Alabama two years in a row. It should have been three, but Ole Miss melted down in 2016 even faster than Hog fans are used to.

The Crimson Tide have the talent to slow down the Ole Miss offense while their offense will likely face better opposition in practice than what the Rebels will muster.

There won’t be any upset here and Ole Miss won’t cover.

Alabama 63, Ole Miss 24

Missouri -5 at Purdue

Even the Tigers won’t mess this one up … at least you wouldn’t think so, huh?

Sooner or later they will realize making Derek Dooley the offensive coordinator might not necessarily be the best idea.

Neither team has much defense, but I don’t think Missouri will cover the spread.

Missouri 42, Purdue 41