Week 12: Occupy the BCS

Get yo'self some Turkey Day football update!

Today the blog will be in a slightly different format. We will begin by recapping the madness that was last week's epic collapse of top teams, and finish with an Auburn recap and Iron Bowl preview. Enjoy. Happy Thanksgiving to all. I hope this entertains you while millions are being bored by the parade.

Nation

• So you remember last week when I said that the schedule was boring and that you should do something else? Well, I seem to have forgotten that outside of the SEC, elite teams really aren't elite and sometimes lose to Iowa State. Or Baylor. Or USC. Anyway, Alabama fans had their greatest hopes realized, while the BCS may have had their worst. 
• Oklahoma State choked massively. I honestly can't fathom how a team with this much offensive talent and skill fell to Paul Rhoads's squad. I suppose 5 turnovers and 87 penalty yards will do that to you. What a huge letdown for the Big 12ish, who saw their National Championship hopes crash with the Cowboys and....
• The Sooners flop to Baylor. Robert Griffin III played like a Heisman candidate, and Landry Jones didn't. If Griffin doesn't get an invite to the Heisman ceremony in New York, then the ceremony should be ashamed. With the parody that exists this season, he may get left out, but it would be a travesty. When Oklahoma lost to Texas Tech several weeks ago, I predicted that it wouldn't be their only loss. I also predicted early that Baylor would upset someone big. I wouldn't have predicted this to be the week, however. Next week's Oklahoma-Ok State game lost a lot of its luster with these two losses.
• A week after knocking off #4 Stanford, Oregon flopped against USC, ending their chances at a rematch with LSU in the BCS Championship game. Matt Barkley looked like a Heisman candidate. LaMichael James did not. Kenjon Barner was the top back for the Ducks, but it wasn't enough, Alejandro Maldonado's kick at the end missed, and the Ducks missed their chance.
• Clemson absolutely flopped. The Tigers turned the ball over four times and lost to a pretty terrible NC State team. I don't think they would have jumped high enough even if they hadn't lost, but this only furthers the mantra that Clemson always chokes. Fortunately for Dabo Swinney, this is a relatively young team, especially on offense, so the Tigers will be back next season.
• Which brings us to the SEC. LSU, Alabama, and Arkansas are the top 3 in the current BCS.  LSU and Arkansas play tomorrow and the Iron Bowl is Saturday. If LSU wins, they will face Georgia in the SEC Championship. Many of the BCS experts believe that they could lose to Georgia and still make the championship. I am skeptical. If Arkansas knocks off LSU, madness will ensue. That will create a 3-way tie for the SEC lead. What happens here is that the BCS rankings determine which team goes to Atlanta. Unless of course the top 2 teams aren't separated by more than 5 spots (which they won't be). In that case, the head-to-head will determine who gets to face Georgia. To me, that seems to give Bama the edge should LSU fall. 
• Disappointing loss for Vanderbilt in overtime against Tennessee. The Dores still have a chance to get bowl eligible with a victory at Wake on Saturday, as can the Vols against Kentucky. 

Iron Bowl

• Auburn and Bama bowl struggled mightily with FCS teams in the first half last week, only to pull away in the second half. It seems to reason that both were probably looking ahead and probably spent the week game planning for one another, rather than for their opponents.
• Auburn will have to play by far its best game of the season and Bama its worst if Auburn is going to come away with the victory. 
• The Tigers have done decently with straight ahead running teams in the last couple years (Alabama, South Carolina), at least as compared with the overall lackluster defense. The Tigers will sell out to shutdown Trent Richardson, and make AJ McCarron beat them. Will that be enough? Probably not, but it's worth a shot.
• Both Gene Chizik and Gus Malzahn insisted that they won't change anything and won't resort to trick plays. I'm not buying that. Auburn has been planning for this game all year. With the struggles this team has had, I expect them to pull out all the stops in hopes of pulling off an epic upset and saving a bit of the season and getting momentum going into next season. 
• Brandon Moseley is questionable after leaving last week's game with a knee injury. If I was putting money on it, I'd say he plays. Eric Mack played pretty well at guard in his stead, as Chad Slade shifted to tackle. Slade and Mack will both have to fight to have starting jobs next season, but even if they don't start, they will be very important backups. 

Happy Turkey eating everyone!

Week 11: Better Late Than Never

Sorry for the delay folks. Mono has been trying to keep me down for about three weeks now, so hence the delay. Anyway, let's get on to a review of last week's action.

Auburn

• Auburn made Saturday's matchup with Georgia uglier than I think anyone ever imagined. Auburn has struggled with the Bulldogs in recent years, but this was worse than anything we've seen during the Chizik era- even this season's LSU game. 
• Auburn got absolutely manhandled in every single aspect of the game. Auburn couldn't run the ball (and didn't really attempt to), couldn't pass/catch the ball (with the exception of Emory Blake), couldn't defend the pass, and couldn't defend the run. Isaiah Crowell and Carlton Thomas both went over 125 yards on the ground, and Aaron Murray completed 18 passes for 224 yards (an absurd 12.4 yard average) and 4 touchdowns.
• I'm not going to dwell on the specifics. It was ugly, and I think all Auburn fans would agree that that is sufficient. Let's take a look at what the causes and solutions are.
• Auburn is getting demolished on the offensive line. I've mentioned before that this is an offensive line that is lacking in both talent and experience. Based on Gene Chizik and AJ Greene's comments this week, they may also be lacking leadership (they're not the only one's). I've mentioned before that this is a ridiculous hodgepodge of guys who really aren't SEC starters. Greene is a converted defensive end, Moseley a converted tight end (both in the last 2 1/2 years), John Sullen is average, Chad Slade might get there, but he's young and not talented enough to make up for his inexperience, and Reese Dismukes is a true freshman. Auburn really needs an infusion of talent on the line in order to turn things around next year. Currently redshirting Christian Westerman and Greg Robinson are extremely talented and will help next year, but incoming recruits will also have to help. Continuity is another big factor, which Auburn may get next year when they put 5 guys out there who they are fully comfortable with and who can grow and gel together. The rest of this year doesn't look so hot.
• The defensive line is young, and is getting handled by bigger, more physical offensive lines. This shouldn't really surprise us, but for some reason it continue to frustrate us. Auburn starters rotation on the defensive line is made up of exclusively freshmen and sophomores. The talent is there for this crew, but experience and strength are not yet on their side. The future is bright however.
• Bad news for T'Sharvan Bell, who went down with a knee injury Saturday. He will require surgery and will miss the rest of the season. The good news for Bell- this at least gives him a pass on the criticism I would have put on him this week. Phillip Lolley and the rest of his corners are not so lucky. The corners were absolutely embarrassed by Aaron Murray and his receivers. They were constantly out of position, beat deep, not looking back for the ball, and just downright bad. Lolley and others made excuses this week, but the reality remains- this unit has to get better. Again, this is a young unit (with the exception of Bell) that will get better with time and experience, but for now they just aren't getting the job done. 
• Eltoro Freeman is playing at an absolutely elite level. The problem is, he is the only player on the defensive side of the ball doing so. Everyone else looks overmatched, undersized, and unprepared. That's what happens when you lose over 30 players from one year to the next, I suppose.
• We saw on Saturday why Clint Moseley didn't get the starting nod from the beginning. When Moseley threw the pick 6 to Rambo, I mentioned to those I was watching the game with that we would now see  what he was really made of. The knock on Moseley has always been the extremes of his emotions- not being able to bounce back from a bad play. I didn't like what I saw. Moseley looked flustered and hesitant after the interception. He will need to build confidence in himself and in his teammates going forward if he hopes to contend for the starting position when next season rolls around. 
• Congrats to Steven Clark who was named one of nine semi-finalists for the Ray Guy Award, given each year to the nation's top punter. Clark responded by not allowing Georgia to advance a punt, and averaging 41 yards.

SEC

• South Carolina knew that it had to keep winning in order to keep its hopes of an SEC Championship berth alive. The Gamecocks did so against a struggling Florida team. Not exactly impressive fashion, but Connor Shaw got it done. Spurrier and company must now hope that Georgia slips up against Kentucky, which seems unlikely.
• Especially since the Wildcats got absolutely mauled by Vanderbilt. Watch out for the Dores. One more win makes them bowl eligible.
• And they still have Tennessee to go. The Vols are winless in SEC play after Arkansas became the latest opponent to tear up Derek Dooley's squad. Tough days in Knoxville, and a likely loss to Vandy won't make it any better.
• AJ McCarron struggled again as Bama picked up an uninspiring bounce-back win over Mississippi State. Alabama may be the 2nd best team in the country, but the offense will have to look much better against Auburn if the Tide hope for voters to give them a rematch in the BCS Championship. I'm sure Auburn's defense will be happy to oblige.
• Ole Miss lost by 20 to Louisiana Tech. For some reason, Houston Nutt is still at the helm until the end of the year. Not sure why a team playing so poorly would fire the head coach mid-season and keep him around til the end. It only causes more embarrassment. 

Nation

• Two nice Thursday wins in a row for Virginia Tech at Georgia Tech last week, and then last night over UNC. The Hokies are in position for a pretty nice rematch with Clemson for the ACC Championship.
• Nebraska gave Penn State its first Big 10 loss in its first post-Paterno game. The Nittany Lions still sit atop the division, on pace for a matchup with Michigan State in the inaugural Big Ten Championship game.
• West Virginia knocked off Cincinnati, continuing to muddle the forever uninteresting Big East championship race.
• Oklahoma State looks quite impressive. I would be glad to see that offense matched up with LSU's defense in a National Championship game.
• Thank you for playing Boise. Hopefully this will finally end all of the nonsense that we see every year about the Broncos deserving a shot at the National Championship. They lose the only challenging game they play every season, so I'm not inclined to ever give them a shot against the nation's elite teams, who play a tough schedule week in and week out.
• As I predicted on multiple occasions, Stanford fell to Oregon. The Cardinal just never really looked the part of an elite contender to me. Oregon is placing themselves in a position to possibly set up a rematch of their own with LSU should a few things fall their way. 

That's all for this week. This weekend's schedule of games is utterly uninspiring, so find something else fun to do.

Week 10: "The Game of the Century?"

A few initial thoughts before we move to the "Game of the Century"

• Penn State ought to be absolutely ashamed of itself for the way that it handled the Jerry Sandusky situation. Coverups as they relate to recruiting or college athletes are one thing, but covering up or even not fully exploring an incident of sexual abuse involving a young boy (which has now become 9 young boys) is something totally different and unacceptable. There should be no one safe through this investigation who had knowledge of the accusations and didn't pursue them. 
• That includes winningest coach of all-time Joe Paterno. A career that probably should have ended a couple years ago in honor and esteem, will now do so shamefully and forever tarnished. This should definitely be JoePa's last season, and Penn State should start afresh from top to bottom next season, ridding itself of any personnel who took part in such a shallow-thinking and heinous coverup.

• Had I posted the blog Sunday when I initially intended to, I would have looked like a genius for the second time this season, predicting a coaches firing within days of it occurring (hours in the case of Mike Stoops). Unfortunately, it took me until Tuesday to post, and thus Houston Nutt was fired before I was able to post my prediction that it would come after this week's atrocious loss to Kentucky.
• I was looking over my Auburn position roster (which has seniors in bold), and realized that were it not for the last month of Eltoro Freeman's phenomenal play, and the last 3 years of frustration and jubilation that have been Neiko Thorpe's career, Auburn fans probably won't notice much change at all when next year's team hits the field. Sure, there will be other seniors gone, but with the young depth that Auburn has been putting on the field and developing this season and small number of seniors on this year's team, the transition should be seamless. This assumes that Auburn doesn't attempt to make Kiehl Frazier the starter, and understands that Auburn will still be likely integrating at least 3 new linemen in all likelihood (Christian Westerman, Greg Robinson, and JUCO commit Will Latu). 
• Missouri is officially a member of the SEC. If that excites any SEC fan outside of maybe Arkansas, I'd love to hear why. Columbia, Missouri isn't exactly a destination roadtrip, and I'm not really sure what Mizzou brings to the SEC, other than 2 big TV markets (Kansas City and St. Louis) and an obnoxious third Tiger.

LSU-Alabama

• To say that those of us who watched the so called "Game of the Century" were a little let down is probably fair. To say that we should have expected different is probably foolish. What we got was a fantastic defensive battle between two fantastic defensive teams, a game that regulation time couldn't decide, and two very conservative offenses. We got what we expected in the defensive department, and therefore to expect a whole lot out of the offenses would have been silly. What we didn't see, however, was any sort of creativity on offense, any risk taking, or any trick plays whatsoever. Granted, those plays are much more difficult against the top tier defenses that the Tide and Tigers possess, but they are at least worth a shot, particularly when you simply can't get close enough to kick a field goal, no matter how hard you try.
• By absolutely no means should the Alabama loss be put completely on the shoulders of Cade Foster or Jeremy Shelley. There is no way that he should have been put in the position to constantly be kicking 45-53 yard field goals and been expected to make them. His previous career long? 49 yards. His success when kicking field goals over 50 yards? 0/3. His kick record for this season? 1/3. This is not a man on who's shoulders the "Game of the Century" should have been placed 4 times. That is simply bad coaching. When you have a Heisman frontrunner, you put the ball in his hands and let him win the game. When it comes down to the 30 yard line and your calls are not good enough or gutsy enough to get you into the red zone, or at least into a reasonable field goal distance, that isn't on the kicker. I've seen plenty of terrible comments directed Foster's way, but this should all fall on Nick Saban. By attempting 5 long field goals (1 successful), and deciding to run out the clock at the end of regulation rather than trying to go for the win, Saban played the game as safely and conservatively as it can be played, and this time, it cost the Tide a shot at the National Championship. Don't blame that on the kicker.
• The Alabama fan's guide to still getting to the National Championship (in increasing order of importance):

1. Auburn beats Georgia this weekend (- to Boise for UGA losing, + to Bama for Auburn winning; Boise probably wouldn't jump Bama either way, but better safe than sorry)
2. Oregon beats Stanford this weekend (Bama would still have to beware of Oregon creeping back up; a Stanford victory would definitely have the Cardinal jump the Tide, at least temporarily)
3. Oklahoma beats Oklahoma State in the final week of the season.
4. Bama beats Mississippi State, GSU, and Auburn.

SEC

• Big win for Arkansas over South Carolina. Keep in mind, Arkansas still has LSU in the final week of the season, and this game has been unpredictable in past years. The Razorbacks could really throw a wrench in things across the country by knocking off the Tigers in Baton Rouge. I don't expect it to happen, I'm just stating the facts.
• I honestly thought before the game started that Vanderbilt might beat Florida. And they did....in the 2nd half. The Dores simply got too late a start, and couldn't pull off the upset in spite of a great comeback. Expect James Franklin's team to continue to improve and to be a force in the East next season (Franklin currently has Vandy with the nation's 24th best recruiting class).
• Removed post predicting Houston Nutt's firing.
• Georgia now fully controls its road to Atlanta for the SEC Championship. Auburn will look to take away that control on Saturday, in Athens. 

Around the Nation

• Iowa beat Michigan. Is that impressive? Not particularly
• Nebraska didn't wait long before correcting me for every saying anything mildly positive about them. Disregard last week's favorable comments toward the Huskers after this weeks loss to Northwestern.
• Southern Miss is having quite the nice season. Unfortunately, they don't play Houston, so we may never know if either was really legit. I suppose the bowl games will tell. Hopefully both get matched up with non-Big East BCS conference teams.
• Big victory for Oklahoma State, at least in terms of confidence (or cockiness). The Cowpokes held off a great effort from Kansas State to slide into the #2 spot vacated by Alabama in the BCS. 

That's all for this week. No matter how much you like this blog, don't make out with it. I have mono.