Ole Miss vs Louisville 9/6/21 College Football Picks, Odds, Predictions

The Ole Miss Rebels meet the Louisville Cardinals on Monday, September 6 in week 1 college football action from Mercedes-Benz Stadium. This will be the first game of the season for both teams. Louisville posted a 4-7 record last year, finishing near the bottom of the ACC. As for the Rebels, they went 5-5 last season and landed two spots out of the basement in their division. Check back all season long for free college football picks at Sports Chat Place. 

Louisville managed a 4-7 mark overall last season, with a 3-7 record in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Cardinals finished ahead of only Florida State, Duke and Syracuse in the rankings and lost six of seven games in the middle of the season. 

This year Louisville retains the trio of head coach Scott Satterfield and co-defensive coordinators Bryan Brown and Cort Dennison. Each is in his third season with the team. The Cardinals are expected to have a strong offense to work with in 2021, so if everything goes to plan the Cardinals could surprise a lot of people. 

Over on the Ole Miss side, they managed to go 5-5 overall last year with a 4-5 mark in the SEC. That put the Rebels in fifth place amid a tough West Division behind perennial powerhouses Alabama, Texas A&M, Auburn and LSU. 

Mississippi stumbled out of the gate with some tough matchups and went just 1-4 over their first quintet. The Rebels got it together about halfway through the season though, and finished 4-1 over their last five. Ole Miss took a 26-20 win over Indiana in the Outback Bowl to cap off the year. 

Louisville is 3-7 straight up in its last 10 games and Mississippi is 4-1 straight up in their last five games. The total has gone over in 12 of Louisville’s last 16 games as well. 

PICK: I’m going to take the Rebels in this one. It should be a really interesting matchup regardless, though. Ole Miss had some issues on defense last year, but were able to compensate for it with a great passing game. The Rebels averaged 556 yards and 39 points per game in 2020 and by most indications that high-output trend is going to continue. 

As for the Cardinals, they averaged 444 yards and 30 points per game last year. They’ll also get Malik Cunningham back after over 2,600 yards and 12 touchdowns. If he can control his turnover issues (15 last year) and if receivers like Jalen Mitchell and Hassan Hall step up, Louisville should be doing great things in 2021. Should be a really fun game to watch.