Auburn football: B/R predicts Mississippi State upset over Tigers

If Bleacher Report’s Week 11 College Football Picks are on the money, Auburn football fans could be spending the afternoon wondering how this season is going to finish after a promising start.

Hail State has played well against the best of the SEC West (minus Alabama) and is certainly an upset threat.

So much so that B/R’s Kerry Miller is predicting an unranked Mississippi State knocking off the #17 Tigers during the 11 am (central) ESPN matinee.

Miller’s forecast comes down to two factors: not trusting the Auburn offense and believing in the stopping power of the Bulldogs defense:

"I like Mississippi State for two reasons.First, Auburn’s secondary hasn’t been special. The Tigers aren’t bad against the pass, but allowing more than 300 yards through the air against Penn State, LSU and Ole Miss isn’t promising in advance of a game against a team that throws the ball 54.6 times per game. And Will Rogers has fared well against better secondaries than this.Second, aside from the game against “Angry About Losing to Texas A&M” Alabama, Mississippi State’s defense has been solid. Even with that 49-9 loss included, the Bulldogs rank fourth in the SEC and 20th in the nation in total yards allowed. And Auburn’s offense looked broken last week against Texas A&M."

Rogers has missed the 300 yard per game threshold just once this season, so it is very true that he can handle this secondary judging off of recent SEC performances. A Texas A&M repeat is easy to imagine, and that’s not good.

It’s going to come down to whether or not the Tigers offense can establish its will like it did against Ole Miss two weekends ago.

Bo Nix has to shake off the Aggie assault from a week ago and the Tank Bigsby/Jarquez Hunter combo needs to establish the run to slow down the pace and keep the ball out of the hands of Will Rogers.

That happens, and B/R’s prediction will be foiled by Auburn football once more in 2021.