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November 14 Sheet

Louisville at Southern Miss (+1.5) - Thursday - 4:35pm Pacific
Weekday ESPN games have been dominated by the home teams who have covered over 60% this season. See no reason for that trend to change tonight. Southern Miss is a solid 6-3 football team. Their only real bad performance of the season came two weeks ago at TCU on ESPN in which they gave up 24 third quarter points in a 37-7 loss. They get another shot on ESPN here and will be looking to make amends tonight. USM's only other two losses came in a 3 point nailbiter at South Florida (riding 18 game home win streak) and by 13 at Alabama. The Golden Eagles are a perfect 4-0 at home this year. They are 4-1 in C-USA play and still have hopes for the conference title or at least a decent bowl game.

Starting QB Micky D'Angelo (clearly better than backup Dustin Almond) missed two games (Cinci, TCU) with a concussion. He returned last game vs UAB in relief duty and is slated to start tonight. This is a big plus for the USM offense. D'Angelo is no star, but he is an accurate passer who is able to keep opposing defenses honest. They also should get stud senior RB Derrick Nix back tonight. He is officially listed as "?" but after sitting out last game completely, I have to think he will play tonight. USM features an experienced offensive line. Four returning starters and four upperclassmen in the unit. They are physical and will pave the way for whoever is carrying the ball.

On defense, USM easily has the best linebacking unit in the conference. Junior MLB Rod Davis is a Butkus award semifinalist. He already has 114 tackles, 7 sacks, and 15 tackles for loss! Sophomore Michael Boley came from nowhere to be a nice compliment to Davis with 98 tackles already this year. The defensive line is solid and the secondary is experienced. This is a tough unit. USM ranks 10th in the country in scoring defense allowing just 16.3 points per game. They rank third in the country in pass efficiency defense. Miami, Texas, Oklahoma, & LSU make up the rest of the top 5! They have given up more than 20 points only once all season and their defensive stats would be even more impressive if not for some offensive turnovers that went for TD's.

Aside from upsetting Florida State in a rainstorm, Louisville has been a major disappointment this season. They come in at just 5-4 and have been soundly beaten in every other major test they have faced this year. The four teams other than FSU they have beaten this year (Duke, East Carolina, Memphis, and Army) have a combined 7 wins and 30 losses. If seeing Kentucky dominate Louisville in the season opener was not convincing enough, being on pins and needles to beat a bad Memphis team and getting soundly beaten by TCU and a very average Cincinnati team is. Something just is not right with this team. In last game vs the Bearcats they only managed 176 total yards and were 2 of 14 on 3rd down conversions and that was on their home field against a defense weaker than USM's. Cardinals star DE Dewayne White (leg) is expected to play but has missed some practice time this week and anything less than 100% from him would hurt their defense. Starting DT Bobby Lafew and safety Jon Gannon are out for this game.

Southern Miss is very well coached by Jeff Bower. They are 27-19 ATS in home games since he took over 12 years ago. This will be just the second time since 1995 that the Golden Eagles will be underdogs at home. USM had a streak of four straight bowl games snapped last year and would really like to get back to a bowl. This game will define their season. Expect an outright victory.

Southern Miss   1 UNIT

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