Rece Davis picks Alabama to win, Tennessee will cover

The third Saturday in October got a lot more interesting after last season’s 52-49 classic between No. 6 Tennessee and No. 3 Alabama. Now, with the Volunteers and Crimson Tide set to do battle in Top-20 fashion again, Rece Davis has made his selections for one of the SEC’s better rivalries.

Davis picked several games with Pete Thamel and ‘Stanford Steve’ on the ‘College GameDay Podcast’ on Thursday. He started by recalling the long, storied history between these two opponents that started back in 1901 and has carried on into the present day.

“So many great moments in this series. General Robert Neyland said, ‘You never know what a man is made of until he played against Alabama.’ Bear Bryant played in this game with a broken leg and scored two touchdowns,” Davis said. “A man called Bully Van de Graaff, Alabama’s first-ever All-American, had his ear ripped. Rather than coming out the game which were the rules of the day, he tried to rip the rest of his ear off in order to continue to play against The Big Orange.

“Of course, there’s the guy who goes viral this time every year, the ‘I Hate Tennessee’ guy. There’s Peyton Manning leading the band, there’s Jalin Hyatt running wild through the Alabama secondary last year,” recalled Davis. “The cigars! An institution and a tradition instituted by Alabama by a Tennessee alum!”

However, when Davis started to break down the game, he admitted it was a bit of a mess to decipher. That’s because, based on preseason expectations, neither team does what we expected them to do all that well.

“This is such a weird game,” admitted Davis. “Before the season, we expected, with Joe Milton, Tennessee would hit a bunch of shot plays. And we expected Alabama, with this big offensive line, to just run the football. Well, as it turns out? Alabama has been sporadic, to put it kindly, at best running it and Tennessee can’t hit a deep pass.”

After considering all things, Davis did close by picking No. 11 Alabama to come out on top for their 60th victory over the Volunteers. Even so, with a near double-digit spread and the Tide’s hit-or-miss nature, he went with No. 19 Tennessee to cover and keep it within single digits in Tuscaloosa on Saturday afternoon.

“I think Alabama is going to win the game. But Alabama hasn’t shown me that they’re going to cover -9.5 against a good team” explained Davis. “They make every game exciting. They take you on a ride right to the end – even when you think they have it in hand.

“I’m going to say that Alabama wins but Tennessee covers,” Davis said. “That line is too big for me.”