NCAAF - SEC Bets - Week 13

11/21/2024

The race for supremacy in the SEC is becoming more and more clouded with each passing week.

There were just four conference games played in Week 12, and all of which had some sort of implication on the College Football Playoff picture. The biggest was Georgia's big win to save their season against Tennessee. A loss would've effectively taken the Bulldogs out of the equation, but they were able to overcome an early 10-0 deficit to cruise to a relatively stress free win.

Texas was tested at Arkansas, but escaped to secure their second best win of the season, according to the CFP committee. That statistic is quite telling to the vast majority of college football fans.

South Carolina got it done at home against Missouri in a back and forth shootout, officially eliminating the Tigers from playoff contention. (Though everyone other than Eli Drinkwitz had already written them off anyway.) The Gamecocks sit at #18 in the CFP rankings and will need some help if they are to find their way into the playoff.

Finally, though LSU was not likely going to make the playoff going into their game at the Swamp Saturday, Florida tucked them in and put them to bed for good in a 27-16 victory. The Gators are playing well behind backup QB D.J. Lagway and could cause a little more chaos this week, which we'll discuss later. It feels like Brian Kelly's seat is pretty warm down in Baton Rouge.

After the week of action across the country, here's how the College Football Playoff bracket would look if the season ended today, according to the CFP committee.

11 of the 12 teams are the same teams that were in last week, though several teams have fluctuated up and down as denoted by the green and red arrows. Tennessee is the only team that fell out, with Georgia moving up to replace them. The Vols are currently the first team out and will need one of the teams ahead of them to lose before the bracket is finalized.

Here's our BSSR CFP Playoff Tracker after Week 11:

Missouri, LSU, and Vanderbilt are now eliminated, but seven teams remain in the mix. And even though we thought it would work itself out eventually, we're now looking down the barrel of the dreaded six 10-2 SEC finishers scenario. All that would take is for the favorites to win out the last two games, plus Texas A&M beating Texas in their regular season finale.

Here are the BSSR Power Rankings after Week 12:

Here's the updated BSSR SEC Betting Challenge Expert Leaderboard:

Week 11 was tough to pick, as evidenced by Alex, Ryne, and myself all finishing 1-5 against the spread. In a week where no one performed exceptionally, Micah maintains a four game lead over Ryne and a five game lead over Jacob and myself. We'll see if anyone can make a late season push to overtake him in the last two weeks of the season. As a reminder, we'll also be picking the SEC Championship Game as part of the challenge, so the crown could potentially still be in play for the big game.

Here's the Guest Picker Leaderboard:

Josh trended similarly to the experts' performances and was not able to find much success in a somewhat whacky week. He at least managed to avoid the last place overall position. There are just two guest pickers remaining who have a chance to dethrone Alex P. as the current overall leader in the clubhouse.

This week's guest picker is Jason Pichola. Jason has played every golf course on Golf Digest's newly updated 100 greatest golf courses in America. Famously, his new Bettinardi putter is worth more than the value of my car. Jason is an avid gym rat and has taken the most steps of anyone globally from November 18th through November 21st of this year. He was also recently recognized as the World's Best Cat Dad for his heroic care for his beloved feline, who is recovering from a devastating scratched cornea suffered earlier this week.

We've made it past all the byes this season and every SEC team will be in action this week. There aren't really any signature matchups, however, as all the playoff contenders are playing either mid majors or bottom half of the league SEC opponents. There have been few unexciting weeks this season, though, so don't be surprised if any upsets occur that shake things up.

As always, you can roll with our consensus picks below to make the slate of games on Saturday even more enjoyable for you.

#9 Ole Miss at Florida (MISS -10.0, O/U 55.5)