Missouri vs. Tennessee point spread: Picking Tigers vs. Volunteers

It’s expected to be a tight battle between Missouri and Tennessee on Saturday, with the Volunteers opening as 1.5-point road favorites. The Tigers are coming off of a hard-fought game against No. 2 Georgia but ultimately didn’t have enough in a 30-21 loss.

Still, Missouri gave itself a shot at the win before a pair of fourth-quarter interceptions from Brady Cook sealed its fate to drop to 7-2. Now the Tigers find themselves hoping to bounce back against a Tennessee team that has won five of its past six games.

On3‘s Andy Staples and The Athletic‘s Max Olson teamed up to make their picks for the game on Staples’ Monday podcast. They ended up being split in who they are taking to win, with Staples saying he is leaning toward Missouri.

“Missouri’s coming off, they put a lot of energy and emotion,” he explained. “They had the open week before Georgia and they poured a lot into that and played well but just not well enough to win. I think they’re good enough to beat Tennessee, but Tennessee had the nice tune-up against UConn. They looked really good against Kentucky offensively. That was not the Tennessee defense’s best game.

“This could be kind of similar to Tennessee-Kentucky in terms of shootout. The thing is, will Joe Milton be as consistent as he’s been? Will Tennessee run the ball as consistently as they have against this defense? I don’t know. I’m leaning toward Missouri here.”

Milton has completed more than 80% of his passes over the past two weeks while throwing for a combined 481 yards and three touchdowns with no interceptions. The Volunteers narrowly escaped Kentucky with a 33-27 win in Week 9 before rolling past UConn by a score of 59-3 this past week.

Tennessee totaled 275 yards rushing this past week, but faces a tougher task against a Missouri defense giving up just 114.3 yards per game on the ground. Still, Olson is rolling with the Volunteers, believing that the Tigers may have a little bit of trouble recovering from the tough game against Georgia.

“I was kind of leaning Vols,” he said. “This would be so impressive. I don’t know how much you’re buying body blows on this one for Missouri, but I was really impressed by the legitimacy of that team playing the way that they did.

“I’m not saying that playing Georgia just makes you wrecked now and you can’t show up for this game, but that would be quite a statement if they turned around and figured out a way to best this Tennessee team. It’s not quite what we hoped it could be, but it’s still gonna give Missouri a serious battle.”

That result would fall in line with the recent history of this game, as Tennessee has won each of the past four meetings. Kickoff between the Tigers and Vols is set for 3:30 p.m. ET on Saturday in Columbia.