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It's the Egg Bowl from Ole Miss (8-3 SU, 4-6-1 ATS) as the Rebels host Mississippi State (7-4 SU, 5-5-1 ATS) from Vaught-Hemingway Stadium on Thursday night at 7pmET.
The biggest question for Ole Miss fans is whether this is the last regular season game for head coach Lane Kiffin, who has been rumored to be taking over the Auburn job amongst others.
Kiffin has a good team that has lost three of their last four, while the Bulldogs last lost three of their past five. Last season, Ole Miss won this game on the road 31-21 as a 2.5-point dog.
Mississippi State started out at 5-1 and everything looked great. They were ranked 16th and then the schedule started getting tougher. They fell at Kentucky, Alabama and to No. 1 Georgia at home. Their only SEC win since beating Arkansas 40-17 at home on Oct. 8 was a 39-33 overtime victory over Auburn on Nov. 5.
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— Southeastern Conference (@SEC) November 19, 2022
Last week, they beat up on FCS East Tennessee State 56-7 at home. The Bulldogs jumped out to a 35-0 lead in the first half and never looked back. Will Rogers completed 30 of 37 for 301 yards with five TDs. They held ETSU to just 11 first downs and 154 yards of total offense.
The Mississippi State defense has not been great, but they do have a great player in cornerback Emmanuel Forbes, who had his sixth pick-six of his career after getting another against ETSU for 82 yards. Overall, the defense is allowing 352.5 yards per game (39th) and just 202.2 passing yards (34th). The run defense (150.3ypg) will be tested in this one. But when you look at stopping teams, they allowed 45 points to Georgia, 30 to Alabama, and 27 to an average Kentucky defense.
The offense is led by Rogers, who is completing 67.9% of his passes for 3,463 yards with 32 TDs and five picks. Like most Mike Leach offenses, they don't run much as they are averaging 78.2 rushing yards (129th) per contest.