(9/13) CFB Free Play (155) Appalachian State Mountaineers vs. (156) Southern Miss Golden Eagles

Appalachian State is 2-0 to start the season with wins against Charlotte and Lindenwood but the first win against the 49ers doesn’t move the needle too much for me because Charlotte has scored just 14 points in their first two games combined and are a rebuilding program in their first year under new head coach Tim Albin. It’s alarming that Appalachian State as 31 point favorites last week against Lindenwood barely survived with the outright win by a score of 20-13. Their offense has performed well enough with Vandy QB transfer AJ Swann but I still question how good their defense is and that unit struggled a lot last season. Appalachian State will face the best team and offense they’ve seen so far in this game on Saturday. Southern Miss is a team with a great amount of cohesion and continuity as their new head coach Charles Huff brought many of his players to Hattiesburg with him from Marshall and many of these Southern Miss players on both sides of the football including QB Braylon Braxton were with Charles Huff at Marshall last season when the Thundering Herd rolled up 52 points against the Mountaineers in a 52-37 win by Marshall against Appalachian State last season. Southern Miss hung tough and were respectable in defeat against Mississippi State 34-17 in their season opener and that was against an improved Bulldogs squad that pulled off an upset at home last week against Arizona State which got to the College Football Playoff last season. I think we have solid pointspread value now with the Southern Miss Golden Eagles as home underdogs here against an overvalued road team that I’m not convinced is all that great of a football team simply because of two wins against inferior foes.

Pick: Southern Miss +3.5 -110