Mississippi State Football 2018 Summer Opponent Preview: Auburn

What’s the expected result of this game?

This will be a difficult one for the Mississippi State football team to win. That isn’t because the Bulldogs aren’t a good team. MSU is going to be a really good team this year. The reason that this will be a difficult game to win is simply because the Auburn game is happening at a relatively inopportune time and because Auburn is a really, really good football team.

The past two years haven’t been all that great for Mississippi State when the Bulldogs face off against Auburn. MSU has lost the previous two games against the Tigers by a combined margin of 63 points.

That doesn’t exactly bode well for MSU.

On top of that, this game is right after Mississippi State plays against Florida. No, Florida isn’t expected to be the toughest opponent in the world in Dan Mullen’s first year, but that game is likely to be an emotional as well as physical test for Joe Moorhead’s team.

ESPN’s Football Power Index gives the MSU Bulldogs a 42.1 percent chance of knocking the Auburn Tigers over. SB Nation’s Bill Connelly’s S&P+ favors Auburn as well, projecting that the Tigers win this game by a slight margin.

Coming off of that matchup with the Florida Gators and being expected to knock down the Auburn Tigers is a difficult thing to ask of this Mississippi State football team. It’s not impossible for Mississippi State to beat Auburn, it’ll just be pretty difficult.