5 Things to watch....

[Saniflush]

5 Things to Watch in SEC
Published: Wednesday, October 06, 2010, 10:00 AM
Jon Solomon -- The Birmingham News Jon Solomon -- The Birmingham News

1. Bounce-back game in Gainesville. For Florida, this week's game against LSU will show a lot about how the Gators respond the rest of this season to their humbling beating in Tuscaloosa. For LSU, going to The Swamp could mark the beginning of the end for Les Miles' unbelievable run of luck. Only at LSU does a team have to bounce back from a win.

2. Spurrier's hook on Garcia. South Carolina will try to do what no SEC team has done since Auburn in 2007: Beat Alabama in the regular season. To pull off what would be Spurrier's biggest win in Columbia, he's going to need Stephen Garcia to mentally be in the game. Where is Garcia's head after oddly getting pulled in the fourth quarter two weeks ago at Auburn? Spurrier will have a quick hook with Garcia.

3. SEC West dominance. The SEC West takes its supremacy to the road this week: Alabama at South Carolina, Auburn at Kentucky, and LSU at Florida. The West is 7-1 against the East this season. A year ago, the West went 11-7 vs. the East during the regular season. If the West pulls off all three wins Saturday -- a big if, no doubt -- the East might as well not bother coming to Atlanta in December.

4. Auburn's October. The Tigers continue to improve and are emerging as Alabama's top challenger in the West. That presumes Auburn survives the next four weeks at Kentucky, home against Arkansas and LSU, and at Ole Miss. Auburn is 3-6 in October in the past three seasons. Under Gus Malzahn, the Tigers have averaged 20 points per game in SEC road games and 30.4 points in SEC home games.

5. No bowls for Georgia and Tennessee? For the first time since 1906, Georgia (1-4) and Tennessee (2-3) each enter their rivalry game with a losing record. Georgia is trying to avoid its first five-game losing streak since 1953. Tennessee has lost 11 of its past 18 SEC games since reaching the SEC Championship Game in 2007. The last time Georgia and Tennessee missed a bowl in the same season was 1977.

SIGN OF THE TIMES


The referee in the LSU-Tennessee fiasco was Birmingham's Marc Curles, who had been working lower-profile games since his crew's suspension in 2009. Curles mistakenly called a crucial personal foul on Arkansas in its loss to Florida last year. Another official on Curles' crew erred by flagging Georgia for excessive celebration against LSU last year. In Baton Rouge last week, Curles and his crew acted decisively and correctly to penalize Tennessee for 13 players on the field amid a chaotic environment.

STAT OF THE WEEK

Auburn quarterback Cam Newton ranks 14th in the SEC in fourth-quarter passing attempts, despite three of his team's five games going down to the wire. Of Newton's 87 passes, only eight have come in the fourth quarter (two for touchdowns), according to cfbstats.com. Newton has one more fourth-quarter attempt than Alabama backup A.J. McCarron. Only South Carolina's Stephen Garcia has fewer fourth-quarter throws than Newton among SEC starters.

Who says we don't run the ball?

[JR4AU]

Who says we don't run the ball?

We do run the ball.  What we don't do, yet, is dominate and own a game with the run.  I think it's more of an attitude than anything else...something you learn through experience.  When this team can take over a game, or rather this OL takes over a game in the 4th quarter to say "we got this from here on out boys, y'all can count on us", we will improve greatly, even though you might not see any stats to back it up.  We're on the verge now, and this OL is capable.

[djsimp]

We're on the verge now, and this OL is capable.

I agree, and I think this game against Kentucky will get us through the threshold.

If the West pulls off all three wins Saturday -- a big if, no doubt -- the East might as well not bother coming to Atlanta in December.

This is amazing to me how the West is so dominant this year and the East suffers from anemia.