Georgia at Alabama odds, pick, prediction: My best bet for Saturday's premier game
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For only the second time in a series that goes back more than 130 years, Georgia and Alabama meet with both teams unbeaten. Hurricane Isaias is forecast to come ashore near Gulf Shores around midnight Friday and move north through the state Saturday as a weakening tropical storm. Governor Kay Ivey has declared a state of emergency in 40 counties, including Tuscaloosa, and Alabama's word as of Wednesday was that kickoff stays at 6:30 p.m. CT.
Alabama coach Kalen DeBoer has his team doing wet-ball drills, Georgia coach Kirby Smart called it "uncertainty beyond my control" and underneath all of it is the best game of the season so far.
History leans one way. Alabama has won five straight regular-season meetings in this series — Georgia hasn't won in Tuscaloosa since 2007 — and last September the Tide walked into Athens and took a 24-21 game that was supposed to be the night the series flipped. Georgia got its revenge in Atlanta, 28-7 for the SEC title.
So both staffs are carrying a split into this, both teams are 5-0 this season, both are built on defense and the market has spent all week trying to decide whether anyone is going to score. It opened Georgia -3, it is Alabama -1.5 now, and the total has dropped from 55.5 on Tuesday morning to 51.5. I think it is still too high.
Here is my betting breakdown for Georgia-Alabama, along with a best bet on the game.
No. 2 Georgia at No. 6 Alabama (-1.5, 51.5)
Alabama (5-0): the offense nobody expected
The side of the ball that was supposed to be the question is the one carrying Alabama. Keelon Russell, a sophomore, is 94-of-132 for 1,414 yards, 11 touchdowns and two picks (both of them back in the Kentucky game), and the last three weeks he has thrown for 320, 365 and 285 yards. Alabama has scored at least 45 points every week, the run game that averaged 101 yards last year is at 186 behind a line anchored by tight end Josh Ford — who broke his arm at Mississippi State, had surgery Sunday and is trying to play — and we rank the whole unit seventh in the country at 3.9 points per drive.
The defense is the quieter story and the one that matters for the number. Alabama allows 78.6 rushing yards a game, third in the SEC. Mississippi State ran for just 18 yards last week, and the Tide defense has 13 takeaways in five games, with the one blemish of Florida State throwing for 377 and scoring 36 points. Our deserved-points model, which reprices every drive by what the play earned instead of what the scoreboard said, has Alabama winning by about 22 points a game on merit against the 29 it has shown. The blowouts have been a little kinder than the football.
Georgia (5-0): a defense that has not played a fourth quarter yet
Georgia allows 13.4 PPG a game, and that undersells it. Of the 10 touchdowns the Bulldogs have given up, five came in fourth quarters with the game long over, and opponents have scored three first-half touchdowns in five games. Get a first down inside the Georgia 40 and you are averaging 2.89 points on the trip. The run defense is giving up 57 yards a game, and we rank the stop unit overall fifth in the country. Saturday is the first time all year it will have to play 60 minutes against an offense that can keep up.
The offense is better than its reputation (11th on our board), and Gunner Stockton has quietly been the most efficient quarterback in the conference (77-of-102 for 1,049 yards, 13 touchdowns and one INT). The backfield did get thinner this week with Chauncey Bowens, the goal-line back, out and Nate Frazier back from bruised ribs. The deserved-points read says the same thing it says about Alabama: Georgia has earned about 25 a game of the 32.5 it has shown, and the 41-13 win over Oklahoma was closer to a two-touchdown game by what the plays earned.
The read
The market has this at right around a pick, and so do we. We make it Alabama 24.1-22.5, and the number sits at Alabama -1.5 everywhere. Home teams are 28-4 over the last 15 seasons when two 5-0 teams meet outside a neutral site. Georgia has the better defense, and when our number lands on the market's number I don't manufacture a lean. The side is a pass.
The total is the bet, and I want to be honest about what it has to overcome.
All 10 games these teams have played went over 51.5. If you are betting the under here, you are betting that the ratings built against East Carolina, Western Kentucky and Vanderbilt do not survive contact with each other, and that is exactly what I am betting.
Start with pace, because Georgia is No. 118 (of 138) in seconds per snap and Alabama is No. 126. These are two of the slowest offenses in the country, as both of them run to set up the pass, both of them have spent five weeks building a lead and draining the clock, and when you put them on the same field, the possession count drops before anybody mentions the weather. The two top-11 defenses take care of the next few points, and the garbage time that built those scoring averages, nearly seven a game for each team by our model, does not exist in a one-score game between the best defense either has faced.
Bet on Alabama-Georgia to go under the total at sportsbooks
Then, yes, the weather, which is the one thing in this piece I will not pretend to know. Meteorologist James Spann's read was that the worst of Isaias reaches Tuscaloosa Saturday morning into early afternoon and the widespread rain could be north of the stadium by kickoff, with 20-30 mph wind in the game. Our weather model has already taken about 2.5 points off this total, and that is baked into our number. If the storm runs late, the rain gets better. If it runs early, this is still two slow, defensive teams in a one-score game, and the number has already fallen four points this week because the market knows it.
Last year's two meetings finished 45 and 35. We make this one 47. The market is at 51.5 — take it before Friday's forecast takes it for you.
Bet: Under 51.5 (-110)
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