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Posted at 10:00 AM EST. Odds are subject to change.

Troy -10½ -110 over Southern Miss 

Veterans Memorial Stadium (AL), Troy, AL

Stream: ESPN2

8:00 PM EST. Southern Miss might be getting a little too much credit for losing, and that's where our interest begins. The Golden Eagles went into Tulane, had the Green Wave on the ropes with a 21-14 lead entering the fourth quarter and ultimately lost by three. That's the type of performance that raises a team's stock without actually putting anything in the win column. Southern Miss looked competitive, Landry Lyddy looked capable and suddenly taking double digits with the Golden Eagles doesn't seem nearly as uncomfortable as it might have a couple of weeks ago. We're selling it.

Lyddy deserves credit for what he did against Tulane, but one good afternoon doesn't erase the larger body of work. He's a senior who has been around college football for years and entered this season as the backup for a reason. When Ethan Hampton went down, Lyddy was thrown into the fire without much time to think about it, and sometimes that's the best possible situation for a quarterback. No expectations, no week of preparation as the starter, no time to hear about everything that can go wrong. Just get in there and play. He played well.

Now comes the completely different part. Lyddy has had 10 days to hear about how well he played, watch the film, prepare as the guy and think about everything that comes with making another start. More importantly, Troy has had those same 10 days to prepare for him. Lyddy didn't suddenly become a different quarterback because of one strong performance. His career numbers tell a much different story, and we're more interested in the larger sample than one game in which almost everything clicked.

The market also isn't being asked to price the Southern Miss offense at its lowest point. It's pricing it immediately after its best-looking performance of the season.

That's important because the Golden Eagles still have significant offensive problems. They're averaging only 94.3 rushing yards and 3.3 yards per carry against FBS competition, so there isn't much of a running game available to take pressure off Lyddy. Southern Miss has attempted 81 passes over its past two games. That's a lot to put on a longtime backup quarterback, particularly when the Golden Eagles are also missing important pieces at receiver.

Then there's the Southern Miss defense, and this is where Troy should be able to take control. The Golden Eagles have surrendered more than 430 yards in consecutive games and have been on the field for 148 plays over that stretch. Their run defense has been getting gashed, the pass rush hasn't generated enough disruption and now they're facing a Troy offense that should be perfectly content attacking the weakness rather than asking Goose Crowder to carry the offense.

Troy's 2-2 record and consecutive 10-point performances aren't pretty, which is another reason this number hasn't gotten completely out of hand. But the Trojans produced 395 yards at Utah State and somehow turned that into 10 points. Their final four possessions ended with two turnovers and two missed field goals. That's not an offense that couldn't move the football. That's an offense that couldn't finish.

Those are two very different problems.

Troy gets a Southern Miss defense that has been considerably more accommodating than Utah State, and the Trojans should be able to lean heavily on the running game. If they start ripping off yards on the ground, Southern Miss will have to commit additional bodies to stopping it, and that's when the vertical opportunities should appear for Crowder.

Most importantly, a Troy lead changes this game dramatically. Southern Miss doesn't have the running game to patiently work its way back, which puts the ball in Lyddy's hands over and over again. That's exactly where we'd like this game to go.

Southern Miss's stock is up because it nearly beat Tulane. Lyddy's stock is up because he played well when nobody expected much from him. Troy's stock is down because it scored 10 points in consecutive games and just lost at Utah State.

We're selling the first two and buying the last one.

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