Southern Miss vs. Alabama Odds
| Southern Miss Odds | +45.5 |
| Alabama Odds | -45.5 |
| Moneyline | N/A |
| Over/Under | 58.5 |
| Time | 7:30 p.m. ET |
| TV | SECN |
| Odds via BetMGM. Get up-to-the-minute college football odds here. | |
A 3-0 start to the season would be great for nearly every other team in college football. You're winning games, fans are happy, boosters are delighted and coaches and players are excited.
But things are very different in Tuscaloosa for Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide.
Only beating Florida by two and avoiding overtime due to one of the worst play calls my eyes have ever seen is far from a win by Alabama standards.
I expect Saban to react this week as if it was a loss.
The Southern Miss Golden Eagles will make the familiar trip to Bryant Denny Stadium this weekend. Alabama leads the series all-time 35-6-2.
No one on earth expects this to be a close competition for Alabama, but will the Eagles be able to cover the massive 45.5-point spread?
Southern Miss vs. Alabama Betting Preview
Southern Miss Golden Eagles
Southern Miss Offense
Long gone are the days of Brett Favre at Southern Miss, and boy, do they miss him. However, there's still an NFL connection on this year's Southern Miss team.
The Eagles have RB Frank Gore Jr. — who was a second-team All-Conference USA selection — and WVU transfer Trey Lowe — son of Alabama great Woodrow Lowe. Both rank as top-60 players at their positions. However, Lowe will not play on Saturday due to a foot injury.
He will be replaced by Ty Keyes, who played against Troy last week. Against Troy, the Eagles rushed for negative one-yards with 156 yards of total offense.
So far this season, the Eagles have losses to South Alabama and Troy by a combined score of 52-16. Anything they can do against this Alabama defense would be pretty impressive.
Southern Miss Defense
Defensively, the Eagles are only allowing 248 yards of total offense on average this season, while limiting opponents to just 17 points per game.
Unfortunately, Alabama is a completely different team.
On the ground, it's limited opponents to just 43.7 rushing yards per game. But as I've mentioned, the teams it's done this against are simply not comparable to what it'll see this week.
Alabama Crimson Tide
Crimson Tide Offense
If you've been a college football fan or, more importantly, a bettor for more than five minutes, you know the stats and info on this team, so I won't dive into it.
Instead, I think it's important to realize this won't be just your standard Alabama game against an inferior opponent.
After sneaking by Florida last week, I expect the Crimson Tide to use this game as a warmup for their massive game against Ole Miss next week.
The Alabama offensive line should be able to push around the Southern Miss defensive front.
Bryce Young needs to work on his consistency with the deep ball and the wideouts need to create separation and cut down on dropped passes.
This offense needs to play a complete game for the entire 60 minutes, which they don't usually do against teams of Southern Miss' caliber. But after last week, I expect Nick Saban to play his starters longer than usual regardless of the score.
Crimson Tide Defense
It's a lot of the same for the Alabama defense, but the Tide have a lot to work on before they see the red-hot Ole Miss offense next week.
I can see the stars playing even longer than the offensive starters, regardless of the score.
The defense should have no issue dominating and shutting down the Golden Eagles' offense. Through three games, the Southern Miss quarterbacks have been sacked 16 times.
Last week, Troy nearly shut down the Southern MIss offense, allowing only a field goal on the opening drive.
After Alabama's performance against Florida, I expect this defense to be fired up and either shut out Southern Miss, or come close.
Southern Miss vs. Alabama Matchup Analysis
Toggle the dropdowns below to hide or show how Southern Miss and Alabama match up statistically:
Southern Miss Offense vs. Alabama Defense
Alabama Offense vs. Southern Miss Defense
Pace of Play / Other
Data via College Football Data, FootballOutsiders, SP+, PFF and SportSource Analytics.
One thing we can't ignore is Alabama's record as a big favorite. When the Crimson Tide are favorited between 40-50 points, they're only 3-9 ATS dating back to 2011.
But as I've said, I think this will be more than a standard Alabama game against an inferior opponent. I expect Saban to keep the starters in longer than he has in the past during similar situations because right now, this team does not look ready to take on Ole Miss.
I know it's a daunting number, but I'm going to lay the point at -45 on Alabama.
And should you feel this number is too large, I would recommend betting the Southern Miss team total under, currently listed at 6.5 on PointsBet. I would bet it down to 6.
Southern Miss vs. Alabama Betting Pick
This spread opened at 44.5 and has moved up to 45 on most sportsbooks. However, some books currently list 45.5 at -105.
I would feel comfortable betting the Alabama spread up to 48.5.
