1. Gary Danielson, I can never forgive you for being Florida's Johnnie Cochran for a weekend in December 2006, but you make it hard to quit you when you laser in on the matchup problems presented by Jared Cook. Danielson was dead on when he pointed out late in the game that Willie Martinez had promised that Georgia would defend Cook like a wide receiver, but they kept trying to cover him with a linebacker. Danielson needed to address the size advantage that Cook would have had over a nickel corner, but around the 13th pass interference penalty that Cook drew, Danielson had a point. Georgia's refusal to change its defense to account for Cook was a real "Bo kicking twice to the Rocket" moment.
1a. Do you think that Steve Spurrier ever dreamed that he'd be coaching a game in which he had no quality receivers and thus had to funnel the ball to the tight end on just about every play?
1b. Pass interference yards should count towards a receiver's total, just like a point guard should get an assist when a pass leads to a foul and two made free throws.
2. If the Georgia defensive line would like to make an appearance in Chris Smelley's backfield, please feel free. Colt Brennan had to be watching that game in Bethesda and saying to himself "where was this deference last New Year's Day?" I'm not saying anything revolutionary when I point out that Georgia is going to need a pass rush in Tempe this weekend.
2a. On the other hand, the Georgia front stoned South Carolina's running game, so there are some positives for the front four.
3. The excuse that Georgia always struggles to score in Columbia doesn't do much for me. Georgia had two games to warm up for this trip. The Dawgs have enough weapons that an opponent should be forced to pick its poison. I'm just not buying the notion that Stafford, Moreno, Green, Massaquoi, and friends can be excused one touchdown in Columbia because Greene, Gibson, Musa, and an offensive line full of seniors didn't cross the goal line six years ago.
3a. Please tell me that the receivers aren't retreating into the hands of Vaseline that they showed in 2006.
4. Was Mark Richt's comment after the game that he knew the contest was decided after Brian Mimbs' 77-yard punt more evidence of Evil Richt? Was he influenced by being in the presence of Steve Spurrier?
5. Riddle me this, Pat Forde: you determined that Missouri is clearly better than Georgia after three weeks. Here is your reasoning:
Georgia wheezed its way to 14 points against a South Carolina team coming off a loss to Vanderbilt. And the Bulldogs needed a Gamecocks fumble into the end zone to avoid a potential overtime. The Dogs haven't looked like anything special yet.
Why is it a searing indictment for Georgia to win 14-7 in Columbia, but we can gloss over Missouri giving up 42 points and a bazillion passing yards to Illinois in the opener on a neutral field? Why is it impressive for Missouri to own Nevada (a bowl team!), but not impressive for Georgia to do the same to Central Michigan (a bowl team as well!)? Put more generally, why are SEC teams criticized for playing defensive games, but other teams aren't penalized for winning shootouts?
5 comments:
Here we go again - the utterly predictable "SEC is Super!" post. Yes - the Cats suck at football and I am longing for the days of The Desert Fox and the 3rd-down quick kick. And most of the Pac had a bad week. But at least they bellied up to the bar and played good teams with winning records from major conferences.
Of course the SEC does well in its non-conference schedule Michael - that's what happens when you play pansies like UAB, North Texas, Western Kentucky, Samford, etc. If the Powder Blue and Gold boys suck so bad, what does that say about the Vowels? (Maybe Neuheisel put some big dinero on BYU on his parlay card last week?) No. 9 Auburn with a 3-2 9th inning squeaker against Missy State? And here I thought the College World Series was in June . . . .
At least the SEC has never had an 0-4 weekend against C-USA. 'Tis better to beat minnows than to lose to them.
You're correct about Tennessee's loss being embarrassing. Keep in mind that Tennessee is the one program in the conference that has not joined the coaching arms race. No one likes Phil Fulmer, least of all Tennessee fans.
Kudos to klinsi for his ability to retain an air of PAC-1 condescension and arrogance in spite of all evidence to the contrary. It takes a special kind of ignorance to insult other conferences on the heels of getting your collective head handed to you by CUSA West.
Mike, I've got to point out a things regarding with your & Danielson's commentary regarding cook. Firstly, as I said Georgia did match up a DB at times on him. He was PI'd twice (didn't show up in his reception line but the penalties were very helpful for SC based on route + situation). Having said that, I'm not sure how easy it is to "stick a DB on him" in a cover 2. I really don't know if it varies based on the kind of base-sets you call or what.
Two, WR Freddie Brown had a huge day (8 catches, 130 yards). Spurrier's WR were far from poor on this saturday (UGA's pass rush - mostly lack thereof - was a huge factor here, of course).
Three, UGA mostly featured nickle looks when not in a base 4-3 (3-3-5 nickle looks at that). South Carolina primarily featured 3-wr, 1-te, 1-rb sets. Richt discussed this in a press conference and PaulWesterDawg elaborated here. Matching up on Cook with a DB wasn't as easy as it sounded.
I don't think any conference with five teams in the top 10 is getting "penalized" for winning games defensively. Not that they don't deserve to be there, but the persecution complex is more than a little unnecessary, IMO.
Also, Forde may be dead wrong in this instance (and he is-we'll see if Mizzou's for real or not when they play Oklahoma, until then we don't know), but I can't think of a single guy on the ESPN staff whose spent more time riding the SEC's jock in the past. Dude's from Kentucky and he can barely contain his glee when a Big 10 or Pac 10 heavy goes down in flames. I don't think there's any kind of conspiracy on his part.
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