KENNESAW – Kennesaw State are currently the favorites to win the Air National Guard Conference USA Championship game over the Jacksonville State Gamecocks.

The Owls are listed as 1.5 point favorites to defeat Jax State in their second matchup of the year. ESPN gives the Owls a 51.9% chance of getting the win despite being the away team in Jacksonville.

The Gamecocks beat the Owls 35-26 in their regular season matchup just 3 weeks ago. That game was also played at night in Jacksonville State.

The Owls and Gamecocks have a decent history since at least 2017. That year, only Kennesaw State’s third season as a football team, The unseeded Owls would defeat the 3rd-seed Gamecocks in the second round of the D-I FCS Playoffs.

Since then, Jacksonville State moved up to D-I FBS in 2023 and the Owls followed them in 2024.

All-in-all, the two teams are tied at 3-3 when playing each other.

Here’s how the teams stack up this year:

This Season, Kennesaw State finished 9-3 (5-1 in conference) while Jax State finished 8-4 (6-0) leading both teams to the title game on Friday, Dec. 5. The Owls are led by Head Coach Jerry Mack in his first year at KSU and JSU has Charles Kelly at the Head Coach spot also in his first year with the program.

The signal caller for the Owls, Amari Odom, has 2,139 passing yards and 17 TDs, on 64.7% completion percentage. He also adds 379 rushing yards and 7 more rushing TDs. Odom appeared in 10 games this season for the Owls. The quarterback at JSU, Caden Creel, has passed for 1245 yards and 8 TDs on 61.8% completion percentage. Creel adds 973 yards on the ground and 6 more TDs through 12 games.

Kennesaw’s leading rusher is Coleman Bennett, who has 634 yards and 3 touchdowns this season. Cam Cook is the rushing leader for Jax State with 1,588 yards and 15 TDs. The receiving leader at KSU is Gabe Benyard with 877 yards receiving and 9 TDs and Deondre Johnson is the leader over in Jacksonville with 564 yards and 6 TDs.

As a team, Kennesaw State scores 29.1 points per game and Jacksonville State scores 30.2 points per game.

Tickets are now live for the game and can be purchased at https://kennesawstate.evenue.net