It’s turning into a tale of two divisions in the SEC this year. Coming out of a fantastic weekend of college football the landscape is clearing up. This clarity is coming in the form of chaos; nationally, many of the top teams struggled or lost this week and in the SEC we witnessed some new power teams supplant more traditional power teams. The west, it seems, is as powerful as the early season indicated and is easily the best division in college football. The east, on the other hand, is a Jekyll and Hyde division; some weeks some of the teams play well and some weeks they don’t. As usual, let’s take our weekly analysis of reactions and reality around the SEC.
SEC Week 4 Reality Check: A Tale of Two Divisions
Game of the Week:
Alabama 42, Florida 21
The Reaction: Alabama is still a national title contender and Florida – while not there yet – has the talent in place to get back to the top.
The Reality: Alabama is a playoff team and Florida is not even close to where we thought they were.
This was the most lopsided 21-point win of the early college football season. All three of Florida’s scores were direct results of Alabama turnovers deep in Alabama territory. Other than the two turnovers deep in Alabama territory, Florida only crossed midfield twice and only had two drives with more than five plays (both only seven plays). Florida’s defense, while capitalizing on a couple of Alabama miscues, only forced two punts. In addition to the four turnovers, Alabama also missed a field goal and was stopped on downs inside the Florida 10-yard line in the last three minutes of the game. If it weren’t for Alabama’s miscues, this game could have seen a 50-point margin. And, if not for Alabama’s miscues, they could argue for top spot this week after FSU and Oregon struggled and Oklahoma’s result against West Virginia, a common opponent, was about the same as Alabama’s result against WVU. Alabama enters a bye week looking strong and Florida enters a bye week with their game in Knoxville in two weeks being a must-win for the team and for Will Muschamp. If the Gators lose to the Vols in Knoxville, their unhappy fan base will follow Emmitt Smith’s example and start calling for change in the Swamp.
Auburn 20, Kansas State 14
The Reaction: Auburn gets quality road win against quality opponent.
The Reality: Auburn shows some weakness on the road.
Look, there is no such thing as a bad road win against a ranked opponent. But the bottom line is that Auburn did not look like a playoff team or a fifth ranked team against a Kansas State team that barely squeaked by Iowa State two weeks previous. Auburn was sluggish in its ground game – only 128 yards – and while the passing game put up some numbers, Auburn failed to put together sustained drives outside of their two touchdown drives. Moreover, Kansas State had three turnovers (two interceptions and a fumble) and two missed field goals. Auburn was lucky to escape Manhatten with a win. Ole Miss, Mississippi State and Arkansas are all hungry to compete in the west and for Auburn to stay on top they will have to play better than they did on Thursday night. Look for Auburn to handle Louisiana Tech and LSU fairly easily before playing six teams of the top 14 teams in the nation in a seven game span.
Indiana 31, Missouri 27
The Reaction: Indiana surprised the nation with a huge upset of Missouri.
The Reality: Missouri’s uninspired performance signals trouble ahead.
For three weeks I’ve been telling people not to sleep on the Tigers. Well, sleeping is exactly what the Tigers did on Saturday. Missouri, like the rest of the favorites in the East Division, blew a great chance to win the division in a year where it’s wide open. While Missouri is getting great quarterback play from Maty Mauk, they have struggled in the first half of every game this year. Indiana – yes, that Indiana – did not allow the game to get away from them as had Missouri’s previous opponents. If the Mizzou defense plays it’s SEC schedule the way it played on Saturday, Missouri could go from first to fifth or sixth in the East by year’s end. Missouri might be the poster child of the Jekyll and Hyde SEC East this year.
Mississippi State 34, LSU 29
The Reaction: Mississippi State pulls the huge upset over LSU.
The Reality: Mississippi State is just a better team than LSU.
You cannot overestimate the importance of this victory. If you read last week’s SEC analysis, you’ll know I was high on the Bulldogs to beat LSU. You’ll hear plenty about Mississippi State this week, so I’ll only say this about the Bulldogs: if they can stay healthy they have a quality team and can be bowl eligible this year; I think they can (not will…can) beat Ole Miss, Arkansas, and maybe Auburn. Texas A&M and Alabama are definite losses. Let’s talk about LSU, for a moment. You will hear it here first: LSU might not even get to a bowl this year. After playing New Mexico State this weekend, they have seven straight SEC games to finish the season. They have to win two. After seeing Mississippi State go into Death Valley on a Saturday night and manhandle LSU, they certainly aren’t going to beat Auburn, Ole Miss, Alabama or Texas A&M. And Arkansas? If they can stop Mississippi State, how will they keep Arkansas from rushing for 500 yards? Not going to happen. That means they have to beat Florida in Gainesville and Kentucky at home to get to a bowl. LSU has historically been a team that loses interests once they are out of title contention. Watch out for the collapse of LSU this year.
South Carolina 48, Vanderbilt 34
The Reaction: South Carolina escapes a much improved Vandy for an SEC road win.
The Reality: South Carolina is the epitome of the Jekyll and Hyde SEC East.
No, Vanderbilt isn’t that much improved. South Carolina looked very mediocre in this game – they certainly didn’t look like the team that beat Georgia last weekend. Vanderbilt put up 379 yards against South Carolina with the same personnel that lost to Temple by 30 points four weeks ago. How does South Carolina get beat down against Texas A&M, have quality wins against a good East Carolina team and a great Georgia team, and then allow Vanderbilt to put up 34 points, including two kickoff returns? Steve Spurrier said after the game that South Carolina has the voters fooled. I’m not so certain that they don’t fool themselves sometimes. They certainly have me fooled; I honestly don’t know if they are East Division Champion caliber or not.
Texas A&M 58, SMU 6
The Reaction: The Aggies continue to roll along heading into SEC play.
The Reality: Texas A&M might be the best team in the country.
Here’s the reality: Texas A&M dismantled South Carolina, is second in the nation in scoring, fourth in passing and eighth in scoring defense. Yes, eighth in scoring defense. Yes, they played Lamar, but they’ve also played South Carolina, Rice and SMU. Rice and SMU aren’t powerhouses, but they aren’t FCS teams either. Texas A&M had one punt on Saturday. One. Kenny Hill is on fire and Kevin Sumlin has that team ready to go. The over/under for Saturday’s game against Arkansas could be a hundred as the Aggies host another team that hasn’t been stopped yet this season. We will see if Sumlin’s defense is for real against Arkansas. If Texas A&M handles Arkansas well, they ought to get consideration for the top spot in standings.
Arkansas 52, Northern Illinois 14
The Reaction: Arkansas avoids trap game against quality opponent.
The Reality: Arkansas is a Top 25 team.
Yeah, I said it. Again we are seeing a team that is performing at a top level being judged by previous seasons. Arkansas did lose to Auburn, but Auburn is one of the ten best teams in the nation. Arkansas has bloodied the nose of every team they’ve faced this season and their running game is devastating. Northern Illinois is a good team. They were in the Orange Bowl two years ago and have four straight years of bowl appearances. They came in undefeated. Arkansas beat them easily. Arkansas plays another top five team this weekend in Texas A&M. While Arkansas probably won’t beat the Aggies, they do have a shot at beating Ole Miss, Mississippi State and certainly LSU. Arkansas could finish as high as fourth in the West, and as young as they are, they are putting the West on notice that they plan on competing in this division for the future.
Georgia 66, Troy 0
The Reaction: Georgia gets back on track against Troy.
The Reality: Georgia still faces some questionable offensive game planning.
Some would also say that there’s no such thing as a bad 66-0 win. Certainly, Georgia’s ridiculously good stable of running backs looked good against an undersized and outmanned Troy defense, but the biggest take-away from this game was Georgia’s reluctance to work on Hutson Mason’s game. Georgia’s running game is working pretty good, why wouldn’t Offensive Coordinator Mike Bobo work on Mason’s passing game a little bit more? And why take him out of the game so early? He’s a senior, sure, but with as little game experience as he has and three straight SEC East division games coming up, why wouldn’t Bobo keep him in and work on some passing plays. They don’t have to give away their playbook, they could easily work on simple timing routes and get game reps far more valuable than practice reps. Let’s face it, it wasn’t the running game that kept Georgia from beating South Carolina. I hope Georgia has confidence that Mason can get them to the SEC championship game in a wide-open East Division.
Overall SEC Analysis:
The conference suffered its first big out of conference loss with a surprising, and horrific, loss by Missouri to an Indiana team that isn’t very good. Other than that, the conference looked strong again this week. We now move into the conference schedule in earnest and the teams will start beating up on each other. While the quality of football played will improve and the emotion and intensity ramped up, some teams will suffer. LSU, Ole Miss and Arkansas will be the teams that are clearly Top 25 caliber teams but will struggle in inter-divisional games and really suffer because of it. The East is a crapshoot. Other than Vanderbilt, any of those teams could get hot and win the Division, although Georgia is clearly the best right now. This tale of two divisions promises to be great theater this fall!
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