STORMY WEEKEND IN THE SEC
Monday 10/7/02
Yes it was a crazy weekend alright, teams rising up and down like a boat in a storm. First you had the Florida Gators, seemingly in the drivers seat toward another SEC East title going down in Oxford (???). You then had the strife-torn Tennessee Vols going through more ups and downs than anybody winning in 6 OTs over Arkansas. Finally you had 2 sets of Bulldogs, one who moved even higher in the Georgia Bulldogs and one who sunk even lower in the Miss St Bulldogs. Now that the storm has passed, let’s assess the damage…
First let’s take a look at Florida… Now I wouldn’t go straight to fireronzook.com but the man can not avoid a bunch of criticism after this loss. Even with all the requisite factors thrown in: we all take this too seriously, these are just college kids playing a game, anything can happen, new coaching staff, etc, etc, etc… there is no way Florida should have lost this game. And this is the first time I will say it, there is no way Steve Spurrier or just about anybody else would have lost this game. How did Florida play so badly? The Ole Miss defense just didn’t up and get that much better in two weeks. Just about everybody in the SEC has run through the Rebel defense including Vandy two weeks ago. But even after watching all that Zook & Co decide they are going to repeatedly throw long on a defense with only 2 LBs in the game. I could understand if it was Spurrier, that was his game (and he still would have won) but I don’t understand it here. Zook has reemphasized the running game but in the one game where he should have just stuck with it, he decides to keep chucking the ball.
Just about everybody who played the Rebels last year didn’t throw 20 passes but simply ran over the smaller Rebels. Then Florida comes in with a massive OL of blue-chip recruits and throws the ball 44 times. However Florida should have been able to win that way too. With all due respect to Ole Miss, they only scored one offensive TD and Grossman served up the other one. Instead of kissing his butt to get him to come back somebody ought to be in Grossman’s face after his umpteenth crucial INT. Nobody is “above the law” and in Zook’s haste to beg Grossman to stay, I think they have pretty much given up coaching him. So he continues to side-arm passes and throw them off his back foot piling up the INTs. Spurrier always had to keep Grossman on a short leash because of this stuff. Bottom line, the Florida defense did the job holding Ole Miss under 200 yards of total offense (???) and the Florida offense could not score more than 14 points and were shut out in the second half. That folks is one of the most pitiful performances I have ever seen.
However it might have been the lucky stroke that puts Ole Miss in Atlanta. After getting this win there is no doubt that if Ole Miss is ever going to get to Atlanta it has got to be this year. There are no dominant teams in the West and the Rebels got this gift win over Florida. They have absolutely got to capitalize on this opportunity. Elsewhere in the state of Mississippi, Jackie Sherill has taken over the top hot seat in the SEC after getting blown out in his first 3 SEC games. Sherill was once again complaining about the other team “running up the score” when South Carolina’s 3rd string QB tossed a TD late. Lou Holtz countered saying that Miss St was still blitzing and he would look stupid just running it up the middle. I think Sherill needs to worry less about the other team. Though I will give him credit for finally cutting out the penalties. State only had 2 penalties all day but lost 2 fumbles and had 3 INTs although 2 of those were tossed by the backup QB.
Next we come to the Bama/Georgia game. Georgia showed they had what it took to win in Tuscaloosa and are flying high. If Tennessee had ended up losing, Georgia fans would have been absolutely delirious but they can take care of that next week. I give major kudos to Georgia head coach Mark Richt for a great game plan. He got the ball to his great WRs and ran off the passing game they were able to establish early. They made mistakes but the overall game plan was superb. Meanwhile it is also time to take a hard look at Bama coach Dennis Franchione. He seems to repeatedly get a free pass for losing close while every other coach gets fried. I am not sure I understand why other than blowing out Auburn last year. On the brink of giving Franchione a 15 million dollar contract I think it is time to a hard look at this guy’s record at Bama.
Dennis Franchione has yet to win one big game over a top team at Bama. The talent level is not great but it is good enough. So far Franchione has beaten Texas El Paso, North Texas St, MTSU, Southern Miss twice, Iowa St, Vandy, Arkansas twice, Miss St and Auburn. Arkansas and Auburn both finished 7-5 last year and Iowa St was about the same. The only teams that might have been ranked when Bama played them were Auburn and Iowa St. I just don’t see any big accomplishments there. The talent level is good enough to upset a good team. Instead Bama has lost to South Carolina and Ole Miss leading late last year. They also lost to UCLA and Tennessee with it being very close in the 4th quarter and were blown out by SEC champ LSU. This year all they had to do in Oklahoma was stop a Sooner offense they had shutout in the second half from going 80 yards for a TD with a little over 2 minutes left. They couldn’t do it. Then yesterday all they had to do was grind out 1 or 2 first downs with the best rushing attack in the SEC after taking a 1 point lead. They couldn’t do it.
In that crucial part of the game, instead of lining up and just taking their best shot, they went into the shotgun formation 2 or 3 times and were stopped cold. Georgia’s defense was obviously wearing down but Bama couldn’t finish. Franchione may have done a good job settling things down and rallying the troops in the face of NCAA probation but the jury is still out on this guy on the football field in my opinion. Sooner or later this guy is going to have to beat somebody good rather than just coming close and if he doesn’t do it this year with a senior-laden team when is he going to do it?
However Franchione does have an ace up his sleeve. If he can beat Tennessee in Knoxville in 3 weeks then he will probably get a lifetime contract regardless of how good Tennessee is or isn’t this year. However if the history I just stated above is any indication, it won’t happen… There is trouble on Rocky Top though. Arkansas did get lucky to send it into OT but it is patently obvious that there are problems with this UT team with the biggest one being team chemistry. They are obviously talented but there is just not that “oneness” that coaches always talk about. Now the UT coaches did one of the worst jobs I have ever seen preparing for Florida but I honestly don’t think this chemistry problem is the UT coaching staff’s fault. You coach long enough you are just going to get one of these teams that just don’t come together no matter how talented they are.
Tennessee does have one shot left. If they can somehow rally and beat Georgia in Athens next week (a tall order indeed after a 6 OT game) that might could bring them together and put them on a roll like LSU last year. LSU didn’t have that chemistry either and were awful losing to Ole Miss giving them 3 losses in the SEC early last year. However they rallied and in one blowout over Bama turned around their season and won the whole thing. Of course there will probably be many more ups and downs for everybody before this year is played out. “Baton down the hatches!” is all I can say…