College GameDay podcast delivers picks for Ohio State vs. Tennessee

Ohio State and Tennessee are facing off Saturday night to cap off the opening round of the College Football Playoff. The Big Ten vs. SEC showdown is expected to be the premiere game of the weekend.

The ESPN College GameDay podcast previewed the game earlier this week. Host Rece Davis was joined by Ryan McGee and Pete Thamel to discuss the matchup between No. 8 seed Ohio State and No. 9 seed Tennessee.

Get your team’s official College Football Playoff watch from AXIA by CLICKING HERE: “Watches that tell so much more than time”

Pete Thamel and Rece Davis expect Ohio State to win, but McGee is going with the underdog Vols. All three explained their picks, starting with Thamel, who expects a close game.

“I have a hard time seeing Ohio State dominating Tennessee, because Tennessee’s strength, their defensive line, is Ohio State’s obvious weakness,” Thamel said. “They have a bunch of young, inexperienced guys, and they obviously called a very poor game around that weakness against Michigan. 

“Can Ohio State come out and win this game? Yes. Do I think they will? Yes. Do I think they’re going to come out and win 40-3? No. Tennessee’s excellent. You have the No. 7 rush defense and No. 8 rush defense in this game. This is going to be a cold, nasty, line of scrimmage night game mauler.”

Thamel ultimately expects a close, low-scoring game, with the Buckeyes finding a way to win.

“I have faith, considering environment and general talent, that Ohio State figures this out and wins a close game,” Thamel said.

As for Ryan McGee, he is going with Tennessee. He didn’t give an Xs and Os breakdown of why he is picking the Vols, though. Instead, McGee joked that he is picking Tennessee for his marriage.

McGee graduated from Tennessee in 1993 and met his wife at UT.

“If Tennessee can figure out a way to get going at all in the first half, then I think they have a chance, because if this is a close game or if Ohio State is trailing at the half… it’s going to be really, really interesting the feeling inside that building,” McGee said. “The crowd is going to be big. All that being said, because I don’t want to be divorced, I’m going with Tennessee in this game.”

Finally, College GameDay host Rece Davis made his pick. Davis was planning on going with Tennessee. However, after spending some time with Ryan Day and the Buckeyes program this week, he switched his pick to OSU.

Davis believes the Buckeyes program is in a good spot now and ready to bounce back from the loss to Michigan to close the regular season.

“I was leaning pretty strongly to Tennessee, and sometimes the worst thing you can do before you pick a game is visit with one team, not the other,” Davis said. “I’ve been leaning Tennessee a lot, probably because I assumed a whole lot of the ole, ‘Everybody in Columbus is mad and they’re going to boo the Buckeyes.’ … I don’t think that’s going to happen.

“I think Ohio State’s going to win the game. So I’ll take the Buckeyes to advance.”