The Tide Rolls

With the nation watching, Alabama puts its foot down

By Chris Landers 

Hey, remember Alabama?

It may seem absurd to refer to a back-to-back national champion as flying under the radar, but as the calendar turned to November college football’s greatest dynasty was in shocking need of a PR guy. The Tide hadn’t done anything wrong, really — the only thing they were guilty of is quietly throttling inferior competition over the last few weeks, while the mile-a-minute news cycle of the Twitter age moved on to that week’s Game of the Century.

As Florida State continued to roll (seriously, someone needs to send out a search party for the entire Wake Forest program) and teams like Stanford and Baylor made their BCS run, there were some cries that, hey, maybe we had anointed Alabama too early. After surviving the Johnny Football blitzkrieg early in the year, the Tide had sleepwalked through the underbelly of the SEC — an underbelly weaker than in years past — and voters and media was starting to get a bit antsy. Was this really the number one team in the country? Are they unproven? We hadn’t seen them in a while, so we figured maybe, just maybe, we had crowned them prematurely.

USATSI

But then Saturday night rolled around, the nation with its eyes on Tuscaloosa for the first time in a while, and as they always seem to do this time of year Alabama made a statement. It wasn’t flashy — Nick Saban rarely ever is — but it was beautiful, and it was dominant. LSU was more than game, led by Most Improved Player candidate Zach Mettenberger dealing at quarterback. And who knows, if the Tigers hadn’t fumbled twice in the first half — spotting the Tide a 3-0 lead when they should have been down by at least a touchdown — things may have turned out differently.

But those What Ifs miss the point entirely: Alabama is as good as ever, the Saban machine simply reloading one more time. Once LSU missed its window of opportunity, the Tide slammed it shut with authority. They got after Mettenberger and completely shut down the Tigers’ three-headed monster at running back, and once the game was tied at 17 early in the third, the offensive line went to work.

It should be said that this isn’t your father’s (or even your older brother’s) LSU defense. They’re young, and a bit smaller and softer in the trenches than in years past. That still doesn’t remove the shine from what the Tide did to them up front, though, which was nothing short of a mauling. TJ Yeldon and Kenyan Drake, the next five-star recruits in a long line of two-headed backfield monsters for Alabama, had a field day in the second half. The Tide didn’t so much beat LSU as they took their will, one deflating eight-yard run after another. Before we knew it, there was one touchdown, and another, and all of a sudden another nail-biter had turned into a romp.

This is how Alabama does business, for better or worse. They aren’t Oregon, and they’re not going to hang 50 in the first half or average 12 yards per play. They’re just going to beat you, badly, over and over again, more a force of inexorable will than a football team. So we’ll keep questioning them, once the next 34-7 slog over Colorado State rolls around, but we’d do well to remember nights like Saturday. Because until somebody takes it from them, the Crimson Tide are the kings of college football.

The Best Game No One Saw Coming

With the country’s eyes elsewhere, Florida and Georgia put on a show

By Chris Landers

AP Photo

The truth is, objectively, Florida and Georgia did not play a very good football game on Saturday (and really, that might be a little too kind). This year’s installment of the Cocktail Party was downright ugly — penalties, turnovers and everything in between from two would-be contenders who have seemingly fallen off a cliff after an almost unbelievable string of injuries.

But despite the poor decisions and even poorer execution; despite the fact that a combined six losses had rendered the game less relevant than it had been in years; despite more stars in sweatpants on the sidelines than shoulder pads; despite Georgia running out to a 20-0 lead early in the second quarter and threatening to turn it into a laugher, the second half in Jacksonville — that beautifully ugly, wonderfully weird second half — served as a reminder that, no matter the records, we ignore this rivalry at our own peril.

It was shocking to see the extent to which the game was ignored nationally. Both teams had taken themselves out of the SEC East race, both entered the weekend unranked and both were coming off of embarrassing losses the week before. College Gameday all but forgot about it, and the most surprising part may have been that nobody even batted an eye — outside of the Southeast, how many fans could have claimed to truly care?

But the thing we underestimated is that relevancy doesn’t mean much of anything when Florida and Georgia get together. Because these two teams truly hate each other, and not in almost quaint, trumped-up, ESPN-hype-video kind of way, either — Florida and Georgia despise each other, to an almost uncomfortable degree. It’s less of a football game than a loosely organized street fight (this year’s edition featured four or five instances that almost turned into full-on brawls), and regardless of what it means to the rest of the country, it means absolutely everything to everyone in that stadium.

Which is why no one should have really been surprised when we were inexplicably drawn to the television, as Florida, fueled by pride and pretty much pride alone, clawed their way back into the game. After a torrid start, Georgia had gone into a shell — star tailback Todd Gurley was gassed, Aaron Murray (as has been the case for much of the season) lacked any playmakers on the outside, and slowly but surely the Gators started to smell blood. It became increasingly obvious that the Bulldogs had no bullets left in the chamber, and all they could do was pray that the clock would move fast enough.

It started with a simple touchdown drive to pull within 13 — nothing flashy from a Florida offense that had struggled to stretch the field all day, just power running and a war in the trenches. But then cornerback Louchiez Purifoy came up with a safety, the offense drove down and scored again, and what had been an afterthought suddenly turned into one of the wildest scenes — and perhaps the gutsiest drive — of the year.

The two teams kept trading blows, Florida unable to finally get over the hump and pick up one final score. The offense down the stretch was nothing short of abysmal, but somehow, none of it mattered — the sheer emotion was captivating enough, a near skirmish breaking out after every whistle, every play seeming like it could decide the fate of the free world. There were fourth-down stands, coaches challenges, and an out-of-breath Verne Lundquist — everything we love about college football every week condensed into 15 minutes. Georgia got the ball back with about four minutes left, and in a season that turned from dream to nightmare in what seemed like an instant, the Dawgs made one final stand.

Gurley, returning for the first time since suffering a high ankle sprain against LSU, gave it everything he had on the final possession, as Georgia desperately tried to bleed the clock. He had nothing left in the tank, falling just about every time he was touched, but he managed to put together four and five yard gains through force of will alone.

And when the Bulldogs had to have it, one more first down to kill the rest of the clock, it was four-year starter Aaron Murray — in so many ways the redheaded stepchild of the SEC, playing out the string in his final, disappointing season — who came through. Murray hit Rhett McGowan, only on the field because of injuries to Georgia’s two opening-day starters, a yard short of the sticks, and McGowan broke a tackle and carried another defender for just enough to move the chains.

It was a somewhat unremarkable ending to a game that was, just by looking at the box score, somewhat unremarkable. But for those of us who watched it, the records and the injuries and the rest didn’t matter. This was still Florida and Georgia, oblivious, at least for a few hours, to the rest of the country and the rest of their season, slugging it out until someone told them they had to stop.

Heisman: A Detailed Composition of the Far Superior Candidates for the 2013 Heisman Trophy Award

By Caroline Davenport

The Heisman Trophy award is one of my favorite parts of College Football. Not only have I been in attendance for two of the ceremonies, I also enjoy how elitist the whole situation gets.

The Heisman Trophy award is named after one of the first true innovators of the game, John W. Heisman. He has an interesting story, if you are so inclined to read his bio on the Heisman website, but the point I am getting at is that this little award, that started as an acknowledgement for the best football player, has turned into an extremely commercialized and completely ridiculous form of achievement for someone who can throw a ball down a field. And I love it.

While the Heisman has changed through out the years, the spirit of John W. Heisman stays with the award, and the players who are lucky enough to win it. This year, the Heisman voting committee will choose a new player to induct into the eternal brotherhood of winners, and this year the winner will be….

Are you on the edge of your seat…because you should be.

Marcus Mariota, Jameis Winston, Johnny Manziel, or Tajh Boyd. Might as well throw AJ McCarron in there too.

Ron Cenoy/USA Today Sports

Frankly, I do not know who will win this year, the Heisman voters like to throw curveballs at us fans quite often. For example, the two times I have attended the ceremony in person, it was to see Eli Manning and Brady Quinn. Does anyone know who won both those years? Jason White from Oklahoma won in 2003…and where is he now? I’m not even sure how to answer that question. White beat out Eli Manning (who isn’t doing too hot right now, but that’s for my NFL counterparts to discuss), and Larry Fitzgerald that year, and had an excellent college career but no NFL career. In 2007, Ohio State’s Troy Smith beat Darren McFadden, Brady Quinn, Ray Rice, oh and Calvin Johnson. Troy Smith is now playing in the CFL after last playing in the NFL in 2010 for the 49ers.

 Needless to say, it seems that recently, the Heisman Trophy means a little less than it used to. It’s like the MVP for the minor leagues; it is an honor, but how much does it mean in the NFL. Right now, it’s hard to say whether or not these last 5 Heisman winners will do well in the NFL. Sam Bradford was playing pretty well for the Rams, until he got hurt last week. We all know what happened to Tim Tebow. What about Mark Ingram… Cam Newton…RGIII…or even Johnny Football? Its difficult to know because we live in the present. Maybe when I look back on this article I’ll think, “Caroline, you were so wrong” or hopefully “Caroline, you are so spot on, why didn’t ESPN hire you faster!”

Now on to the men in contention (in two sentences or less):

Marcus Mariota: Oregon, National Championship contender, has passed for 2281 yards with ZERO interceptions and 20 touchdowns. He has a pass completion average of 64% and he’s only a sophomore. I like his odds. (oops three sentences)

Jameis Winston: Florida State, and is dominant in the ACC. Winston has passed for 2177 yards, has 23 touchdowns and 4 interceptions, with a pass completion average of about 70%.

Johnny Manziel: aka Johnny Football, has already won the Heisman, is he looking for a second? This Texas A&M Aggie has thrown for 2594 yards, with 22 touchdowns and 8 interceptions, with a pass completion average of 73%.

Tajh Boyd: this Senior Clemson quarterback has passed for 2243 yards, 17 touchdowns and 5 interceptions. Clemson’s only loss this season is to Winston and the Seminoles, but will this loss affect his standing with the voters?

AJ McCarron: he’s so good, he’s forgotten about, because he’s been so good for so long. This Senior Alabama quarterback has passed for 1862 yards, with 16 touchdowns and 3 interceptions, and a 69.4% pass completion average.

In conclusion, I can’t say who is going to win, and what that will do for their career in the NFL. I just love seeing how it all unfolds.  

Seriously, Does Anybody Want the SEC East?

 After a late Missouri collapse, another one bites the dust

At this point, we’re pretty much incapable of discussing the SEC West without resorting to at least a little hyperbole. The division features arguably the greatest dynasty ever (Nick Saban’s unstoppable Crimson Tide), the greatest player ever (some guy named Johnny down at Texas A&M) and what has over the past decade become one of the best rivalries in college athletics (LSU and Alabama).

L.G. Patterson/AP

It’s the division that keeps on giving, week after week, year after year, so much so that in 2013 its managed to hide a dirty little secret: its little brother to the east has been underwhelming at best. A lot of this isn’t the East’s fault, really. Georgia and Florida have been perennial standard bearers, but this year each has been reduced to a MASH unit. But South Carolina, who many thought could finally break through this season, has disappointed, and the East’s last hope — 7-0 Missouri — went down in a blaze of glory last night against the Gamecocks.

The Tigers had managed to rocket up the rankings, from unranked to fifth in a matter of weeks, on the strength of reputation alone. The only marquee wins for Missouri were on the road at Georgia and a romp over Florida at home. Any other season, that would be a heck of a resume. But this is bizarro world, where Georgia was down their two starting running backs and their top three receivers and the Gators were missing an All-American defensive tackle and their entire starting backfield (and were a bit overrated to start the year anyway).

Missouri was exposed a bit last night, in spectacularly brutal fashion. Backup QB Maty Mauk, who had become a folk hero after filling in for injured started James Franklin against Florida, came back down to Earth, completing just 10 of 25 passes and struggling badly down the stretch when the Tigers needed a score. And once Connor Shaw entered the picture, the vaunted Missouri D suddenly looked vulnerable.

Amid all the plaudits the Tigers front seven had received over the last two weeks, what had become lost in the shuffle is that Mizzou had played two teams bereft of any talent at the skill positions. Yes, they throttled Aaron Murray, but he had nobody to throw or hand off to, and Florida has struggled mightily on offense all season. Shaw, who didn’t start the game due to injury but came on in relief as the Gamecocks failed to put even a single drive together, was the Tigers’ stiffest test yet, and they failed.

Down 17-0 in the fourth quarter, the senior engineered three scoring drives to force overtime, as Mauk folded and the clock couldn’t move fast enough. Mizzou had a chance to force a third overtime, but a 24-yard field goal clanked off the left upright, and just like that, the dream season had gone up in smoke. SEC fans love to crow about how difficult a league it is, and historically they’ve certainly been justified — even when their teams lose, it’s because they have a brutal in-league gauntlet to run.

But hiding behind aura and a flashy name shouldn’t cut it this year. There are too many great teams elsewhere, including almost all of the Pac-12 North, to ignore while the SEC cycles through teams that don’t seem to even want a trip to Atlanta for the conference title game. All eyes will be on the Cocktail Party, as they always are, but maybe this time it’ll feel just a little less special, as the country greets the underachieving East with a bit of a shrug before looking elsewhere.

Whatever Happened to Johnny Football?

It would have been a laughable question a month ago, but is Johnny Manziel actually underrated?

By Chris Landers

Nick De La Torre/AP

Johnny Manziel was a revelation last season, to the point where — for all the constant hype and all the hardware — it’s still hard to understate just how great he was. His 2012 campaign was quite possibly the single greatest offensive display college football has ever seen: over 5,000 total yards and 47 total touchdowns while completing 68% of his passes against the best defensive conference in the country.

Cut those numbers in half and it would’ve been an impressive and exciting debut for a redshirt freshman on a team transitioning to the SEC. And the cultural storm that is Johnny Football only grew over the summer, as the weight of expectation started to crush the 19-year-old who enjoyed relative anonymity just nine months prior. But despite the laughably hyperbolic media frenzy, a funny thing has happened as the 2013 season wears on: Johnny Manziel — yes, that Johnny Manziel — is the most underrated player in the country.

After the Aggies fell to Alabama in the new Game of the Century, Texas A&M — and its iconoclast quarterback — fell out of the national consciousness a bit. So you’d be forgiven for not noticing that Manziel, in a lot of ways, has been even better than his Heisman-winning freshman season. To reiterate: the guy set the world on fire the way no one ever has, and came back even better.

The numbers bear this out. He’s on pace for more passing yards and a better completion percentage than 2012, and although his rushing numbers are slightly down, that’s a bit misleading. Take his first two games against Rice (played only a few series) and Sam Houston State (only seven carries in a game that quickly became a laugher), and here are his rushing averages: 93 yards and one touchdown per game on over seven yards per rush.

That’s slightly down from the video game numbers he put up last season (and really, that might be doing a disservice to video games), but given the uptick in passing yards and the increased burden he’s had to carry, you can make the argument that Manziel is on pace for an even better season.

And that’s the thing that no one seems to want to acknowledge about Manziel: He’s a one-man wrecking crew on a team that probably doesn’t deserve him. The Aggies are loaded at wideout, which certainly helps after the graduation of Ryan Swope and Uzome Nwachukwu, but Texas A&M lacks elite talent around their superstar. Their defense has been shaky at best and dreadful at worst, giving up 49 points to the Crimson Tide and over 30 in consecutive games against Arkansas and Ole Miss. Kevin Sumlin deserves a ton of credit for the recruiting classes he’s bringing to College Station, but the team surrounding Manziel would be middling at best in the brutal SEC West.

The nation is largely sick of hearing about Johnny Football, and there’s not a small amount of truth in that. He’s been entitled, he’s been childish, and he’s seemingly gone out of his way to welcome the criticism that inevitably finds him. But that shouldn’t diminish just how transcendent Jonathan Manziel is on a football field. Because when all is said and done, he just might be the best player in the history of college football, and we’ll have been too disillusioned to notice.