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The 2007 season has been a year of upsets. Very few people could have foreseen some of the strange events happening in college football on Saturdays. We don't make a prediction unless there are warning flags that pop up. If we hear enough "management rules" being broken by one coach, then we listen to how the opposing coach is managing his team. Then we watch to see how the professional betters predict the point spread. If they go with the coach who is mismanaging his team, we make a call for the SEC Upset of the Week. There is a one game of particular interest to us this week, the Tennesssee vs South Carolina game in Knoxville. The Vols are favored by 2.5 points. Tennessee will not win; let us break it down.

Last week, Tennessee marched into Tuscaloosa and played well in the first half. By the time the game was over, Bama had walked away with a 41-17 blowout against a Tennessee team that was more talented. Rule #7 in our book of leadership states that a leader must acknowledge his mistakes before he can move forward. Our first flag was at the Tuesday press conference when Coach Phillip Fulmer said they let one get away in Alabama. When you lose by three points, you may have let one get away. Tennessee lost to Alabama by 24 points, it was embarassing for the fans.

Our second flag for Fulmer was listening to him talk about the Gamecock players. He began by talking about the kicking game and then made references to certain players possibly being the best in the SEC. South Carolina has no superstars. The Gamecocks have a young talented team- no more, no less. Our take on the comments is that Phillip Fulmer believes his team is more talented than South Carolina. We believe Fulmer believes he will beat Spurrier and a lot of the fan griping will go away. We mark this down as overconfidence which will get a leader in trouble quicker than anything. With the professional betters putting the Vols up by three, it confirms for Fulmer the way Fulmer thinks.

Our third flag was the Fulmer self-improvement plan for his players started after the Bama defeat. It is too late in the season to start new systems. In the heat of battle, it all comes down to focus. From a management perspective, it comes across as desperate, busy-work, to make it look like you are making management decisions. From a player standpoint, it is just one more thing to do in an already hectic schedule. From an analyst viewpoint, the Vols need to focus on one game only, right now. Too many activities make for a distracted mind. When players get frustrated they have a hard time focusing and executing.

Moving on down to Columbia, Steve Spurrier said his offensive team played poorly. He clearly pointed out that his team was an average team playing above its potential for a few big games. The Gamecocks lost to Vandy and they clearly did not meet expectations. Spurrier is using the same strategy that he used prior to the Georgia game. Spurrier is not talking about Tennessee, but he is talking about fixing major problems on his team. Spurrier closed off practices to reporters and told his players not to talk to the media. In our opinion, Spurrier is re-grouping his team. He is getting them focused, and he does not want any distractions. These strategies being used by Spurrier are how teams win.

Spurrier is playing the cards very low key, but he is not making any predictions that would excite the Vol players. We see a upset in the making. We see the same type of game as the Georgia/South Carolina game.

We believe it will be close, but South Carolina wins in Knoxville 24-16.

Jay Holgate is an analyst with SECSportsReport.com

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