2009 New Orleans Bowl
The New Orleans Bowl isn't one of the marquee bowls and this year's participants, Southern Mississippi and Middle Tennessee State, aren't marquee teams, but this prove to be one of the more entertaining bowl games of the season.Southern Mississipi is favored by 3.5 points and the total on the game is 58.5.
Middle Tennessee enters the contest with a 9-3 record and were an impressive 9-3 against the point spread this season. The Blue Raiders are led by quarterback Dwight Dasher, who ran for 953 yards and 11 touchdowns, while throwing for more than 2,600 yards and 21 more scores. MTS averaged 31 points per game this season and could do some damage against a Southern Miss defense that allowed 27 points per game.
Southern Miss also averaged 31 points a game and the Eagles were able to survive the early season loss of starting quarterback Austin Davis. Southern Miss gets the nod in schedule strength and should have a slight home field advantage.
This is a tough game to call, but I'll give a slight lean to Southern Miss to get the job done.
