The Tennessee game is enormous now

[MSUDC11]

Not in terms of moving the program forward, but in terms on not letting this snowball out of control this season. We lose to UT and Davis Wade will be purple and gold in three weeks.

Can still get to 7-5 even if we don’t look pretty doing so, and that feels important at this point. And shoot, I have no faith in us winning on the road but A&M is a very average football team. At first glance we SHOULD have at least a 50/50 chance in every remaining game other than LSU and Bama. But three key games are on the road and I struggle to see this coaching staff having us prepared enough to win all three.

I’m struggling to give Joe the benefit of the doubt anymore after last night was yet another disorganized mess. But if you thought the melt last night was bad, let us lose to a 1-4 Tennessee team and see how bad it can really get.

 

[msstate7]

Call me a terrible fan or whatever, but there's no chance I'm going to watch us face the LSU offense

 

[Nunya.sixpack]

Call me a terrible fan or whatever, but there's no chance I'm going to watch us face the LSU offense

You're a terrible fan

 

[UpTheMiddlex3Punt]

Call me a terrible fan or whatever, but there's no chance I'm going to watch us face the LSU offense

You're whatever

 

[woozman]

Good grief people - TN lost to 17’n GA State. We are not going to lose that game.

 

[MSUDC11]

Good grief people - TN lost to 17’n GA State. We are not going to lose that game.

I think we probably win, but it’s incredibly naive to think there’s no way we can lose to them. They recruit better than us and we have been a train wreck on the road the last two years.

 

[Msubulldogfan1]

All hands on deck vs UT for sure. Coming off a bye week, must win.

 

[dorndawg]

LOL.

 

[woozman]

They recruit better than us and we have been a train wreck on the road the last two years.

They recruit better than us based on 24/7 and the bump they give all historical blue bloods? The on the field results the past decade tell me that that statement is not even close to true.

We have not been good on the road vs top 10 opponents for a hell of a lot longer than “the last two years”. Now TN has been a train wreck “the last two years” - In Knoxville and on the road. No way we lose that game...

 

[57stratdawg]

We will not go 3-0 against UT, Ark and OM.

 

[MagicDawg]

Tennessee, Arkansas, and Ole Miss have all played better games this season than we did against KSU and Auburn. I hope we will learn to stop saying things like "We will NOT lose" or "There is NO WAY we lose."

I remember when we couldn't lose to Kansas State. And Iowa. And Kentucky. And Florida. And South Alabama. And Troy. And Maine. And the list goes on.

We can absolutely lose to any team left on our schedule including Abilene Christian, on any given Saturday, if we go out there thinking we don't have to fight for it.

 

[Rupert Jenkins]

I think we will win 4 more games. Ole Miss will be tough in my opinion but I don't think either of those 4 have a strong D line. But this team sure has the ability to totally suck at any moment and throw away a game.

 

[MSUDC11]

Ole Miss just ran for almost 300 yards against Bama. I realize that garbage time makes up a chunk of that, but I’m not convinced our defense is much better than Bama’s backups at the moment. I’m terrified that we will come out flat and they’ll have a good gameplan and punch us in the mouth on our homefield yet again.

We won the games last year similar to Tennessee, Arkansas, and Ole Miss mostly because our defense totally suffocated bad teams. We don’t remotely have that defense anymore, and our offense has been hit or miss. We’ve had better teams than this one who’ve had to struggle to beat bad SEC teams in the past, we’ll be favored in those games but we sure haven’t shown any reason to be overwhelmingly confident about them yet.

 

[Oak23]

Tennessee game maybe the biggest game of the year for both Teams. This game is sandwiched remarkably between #3 Georgia and #1 Alabama for them. Not sure if or how this helps us but I don’t think it could hurt. Still, A loss could possibly result in a 5-7 type season for us. A win could result in a 6-6 season or better of course. Hopefully the narrative includes Schrader having the best game of his life to this date while the defense is adequate.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

We should still crush Tenn, Ark and OM. The only thing that gives me pause is Tenn and Ark are both on the road and our team can't focus when we're on the road. Hopefully having Gay, Autry (for 2 of them) and Murphy back helps the D focus.

 

[Willow Grove Dawg]

I have seen nothing that makes me believe Joe will have us prepared to play a SEC team on the road that has anywhere close to our talent level.

 

[patdog]

We should have beat Kansas St. We should have played Auburn within a couple of touchdowns.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

Woozman, we got creamed under Dan on the road bc we had no ability to pass the ball against good defenses. We got creamed at home too. Right now, we shoot ourselves in the foot repeatedly on the road by means of not being prepared to play a football game.

Auburn really didn't have to do much at all and they were up 21-0 on us because of our own self destruction. And not self destruction from dropping passes and tripping over our own feet. Self destruction from not being able to do the most basic things in football: line up correctly and get a damn played called on time.

Delay of game on the opening kick? You do that against teams like Tenn and yeah they can beat us.

The offense is actually pretty good with Shrader, but we can't self destruct or anyone can beat us.

 

[msstate7]

We should still crush Tenn, Ark and OM. The only thing that gives me pause is Tenn and Ark are both on the road and our team can't focus when we're on the road. Hopefully having Gay, Autry (for 2 of them) and Murphy back helps the D focus.

We haven't really crushed anyone this year

 

[TheStateUofMS]

I agree. Surely it can't get any worse though right?

Maybe we should script our first 15 plays? I don't think there's anything fundamental that Joe preaches/practices enough to ingrain it in our player's heads.

Joe should script a couple 4 and 1/ 1st and goal from the 3inch line plays as well while they're at it....good grief.

 

[BigMotherTucker]

This is a thing that is true

 

[BigMotherTucker]

I just shake my head when I see someone type "we will crush..." or "we should crush..."

I haven't seen anything from this team or coaching staff to support that. We're soft and habitually unprepared. It will be a miracle for us to get to 7 at this point. I think 5 wins is more likely.

 

[Diggin Out Yo Wife]

I just shake my head when I see someone type "we will crush..." or "we should crush..."

I haven't seen anything from this team or coaching staff to support that. We're soft and habitually unprepared. It will be a miracle for us to get to 7 at this point. I think 5 wins is more likely.

If we go 5-7, which will include 2 losses to the goof troop of UT, Arkansas and Ole Miss, then it'll get bad for Moorhead. If he loses to this Ole Miss team at home, oh my.

I doubt it comes to that, though.

 

[CookieMonster.sixpack]

I hope we will learn to stop saying things like "We will NOT lose" or "There is NO WAY we lose."

You hope in vain.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

Haven't played teams as bad as UT or Ark either.

 

[TheStateUofMS]

Yeah I said we "should" not "we will," and we are more talented than Tenn, Ark and OM. We SHOULD crush them. Didn't say we will. Maybe see what else I posted rather than just the first few words of the post.

 

[johnson86-1]

Ole Miss just ran for almost 300 yards against Bama. I realize that garbage time makes up a chunk of that, but I’m not convinced our defense is much better than Bama’s backups at the moment. I’m terrified that we will come out flat and they’ll have a good gameplan and punch us in the mouth on our homefield yet again.

We won the games last year similar to Tennessee, Arkansas, and Ole Miss mostly because our defense totally suffocated bad teams. We don’t remotely have that defense anymore, and our offense has been hit or miss. We’ve had better teams than this one who’ve had to struggle to beat bad SEC teams in the past, we’ll be favored in those games but we sure haven’t shown any reason to be overwhelmingly confident about them yet.

You mean Bama's third string right? I assume their backups are better than our 1st string.

 

[$altyDawg]

As bad as I hate the saying "it is what it is", this season pretty much is what it is. We knew that we were taking a hit on defense by losing 3 players to the NFL, but then comes tutorgate. After losing those 3, and suspensions and injuries, there's no good way to gauge what our showing will be from week to week.
I'll say this about Arky and UT: Even though they are on the road, I feel much better about them if the suspended players are playing in those games. Gay has 3 left, so I suspect he'll be in both the Arky and UT games, plus UMISS, but Autry only has 2 left, so who knows.
Like the OP said, the Tennessee game is enormous now. So far Moorhead has managed to win games like this before (Auburn last year, and Kentucky this year), so we'll see. If we come out hesitant and tentative in Knoxville, it will not be pretty, and if you think the outrage is high right now, just see what a loss against the Vols or Hogs will bring.

 

[Rupert Jenkins]

The rest players on our D line are freshmen. Our O line gets whipped when we play against any team with a good D line. OM will be a battle. We suck in the trenches, playing tons of freshmen everywhere except the O line, can not get any consistency at QB or really anywhere else. I would be happy with the team and coaches if we could pull out 4 more wins in this disaster season.