The Good, the Bad, & the UGAly
Cats win on Rocky Top, Hogs D making noise, & Tide rolls

The Good

The Tennessee Quarterback Room*
(*if you’re a Gators fan) 

Last time we won in Neyland: today pic.twitter.com/H3ViaiMAF8

— Kentucky Football (@UKFootball) October 17, 2020

Tennessee QB Jarrett Guarantano threw back-to-back pick sixes in the second quarter. Not to worry, head coach Jeremy Pruitt sent in backup J.T. Shrout in to promptly throw an interception on his first pass attempt. Kentucky then added another field goal to go up 17-0.

Rocky Top has had four years to find a replacement for Guarantano and, yet, nothing has emerged.

Pruitt has two running backs in Ty Chandler and Eric Gray who would carve out playing time at any school in the SEC. The focus of this offense needs to be entirely on these backs.

It helps that Guarantano is also capable of picking up a few yards on the ground. The Volunteers need to stay grounded and take the games out of the hands of the quarterback. Run a poor man’s Baltimore Ravens-style of offense in Knoxville until competent quarterback play emerges.

Cheers to everyone who thought Pruitt was anything more than Diet Muschamp

— David Wunderlich (@Year2) October 17, 2020

Woo Pig Sooie!

Good morning to Hudson Clark fans and Hudson Clark fans only. pic.twitter.com/8lolvyKj8G

— Arkansas Razorback Football (@RazorbackFB) October 18, 2020

Sam Pittman’s Hogs did what Florida, Kentucky, and Alabama could not…slow down Lane Kiffin and the Ole Miss offense.

Razorbacks DC Barry Odom, who may be the second best hire in the SEC behind Pittman,  saw his unit surrender 442 total yards, but the defense more than made up for those yards by securing seven turnovers, including three inceptions by freshman DB Hudson Clark.

Two key turnovers for the Arkansas defense came after QB Feleipe Franks turnovers on back-to-back possessions. Franks fumbled on a sack, Ole Miss recovered, but QB Matt Corral threw a pick. On the following possession, Franks threw a pick, however, Corral answered with another interception of his own. That sequence of events served as a good representation of this game. Anytime Ole Miss looked like they were building momentum, the Hogs would come up with a big play to squash it.

Both of the sexier SEC West hires in Mississippi have now been bedeviled by Sam Pittman. Woo Pig Sooie!

Muschamp’s October Surprise

Great Catch ⁦@shismith13⁩, but better dance Director of Football Ops George Wynn!! #GoCocks! pic.twitter.com/G0S5BjjtZu

— Will Muschamp (@CoachWMuschamp) October 18, 2020

Big win for Muschamp and the Gamecocks!

Muschamp is 28-27 in his fifth year at South Carolina and there have been rumblings around his job security over the last couple of years, but wins like this stave off any major discontent from bubbling over.

When Steve Spurrier took over at Carolina in 2005, Florida was in year one of the Urban Meyer era, Richt had Georgia rolling, and Tennessee was still a well-regarded program. The Head Ball Coach fought to build Carolina, but the double-digit wins in the latter stages of his tenure may have set up an unrealistic standard for Muschamp to attain with any regularity.

Muschamp is dealing with Georgia at the height of their powers, a rising Florida, a highly competitive Kentucky program, and an “I-think” improving Tennessee (one step forward, two steps back type of improvement).

The man doesn’t get paid $4.2 million per year to make excuses about how tough it is to win in the SEC, but I hope Carolina gives a little consideration to the difference in the environment when measuring Muschamp’s success.

He’s the perfect fit in Columbia. His teams can go 7-5 on a regular basis and sprinkle in the occasional 8-4 or better record. The defense will always have fop-tier talent and God help us all if his teams ever go 2019 LSU on us and actually figure out how to play offense at a high level.

The Bad

Welp…the Florida Gators football team has been officially dragged into the election.

Anyone else ready for election season to be over?

This part of the piece is not meant to support anything other than Dan Mullen and the Florida Gators since this ad completely distorts the truth around what Mullen said last week.

Let’s start with a common-sense, non-political statement: gloating over a spread of a virus seems like not a great way to get your message across to folks in a swing state, but hey…I’m no marketing guru.

I realize Mullen received backlash for comments made out of frustration after a loss in an environment where thousands of Aggie fans were swaying arm-in-arm. Here’s a clip from the stands in College Station:

Mullen is a public figure who should be more careful with his statements. It’s fair to criticize what he said. It’s even more fair to criticize his comments after they served as the main fodder behind creating an out-of-context ad which was nothing more than an attempt to capitalize off of what’s been a difficult situation in Gainesville this past week.

It’s been a difficult year and, if we’re all honest, we’ve each had moments of frustration where we wish the world would return to normal as soon as possible. This applies to people will vote left and people who will vote right on November 3.  Mullen had his moment in front of a bunch of microphones.

Here’s another non-political statement: Lincoln Project, get Dan Mullen’s name out of your mouth!

The UGAly

That’s Nick Saban’s third straight positive result against Kirby Smart.

— Cecil Hurt (@CecilHurt) October 18, 2020

Two halves of football worked toward the benefit of Georgia last week. This week…not so much.

A slow start for the Doggies led to a high-level second quarter performance which had many Gators doing some anxiety-filled soul-searching three weeks before The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party. Luckily, the Peach State Pups came back to Earth.

Yes, the UGA defense was scorched for 41 points and 564 total yards and, yes, Bama QB Mac Jones went over 400 yards again, but let’s focus on the UGA offense.

QB Stetson Bennett settled in after a few batted balls early on and led the Dawgs to four straight scoring drives to close out the first half. The offensive line was clicking, the running game looked good, and Bennett went 9/17 for 152 yards passing with two touchdowns.

https://twitter.com/colecubelic/status/1317630425502724096?s=20

The wheels came off in the second half. Two punts led into two Bennett interceptions which served as the final nails in UGA’s coffin. The first pick in the second half was simply a slight overthrow, but the second pick came, down by 10 points, and looked like the type of mistake you’d expect a backup to make.

Bennett  has been one of the better storylines in the early part of the college football season, but we may have witnessed the final chapter. It’s clear that Bennett can play and it’s clear that Georgia can compete with him at the helm, so why move on from a good thing in Bennett?

This team’s ceiling would be higher with J.T. Daniels.

Kirby Smart has won the SEC East, the SEC, and a College Football Playoff game. Kirby Smart has not beaten Alabama. Beating Bama needs to be the number driver behind all of his decisions going forward.  Bennett earned his shot last night. To quote 27% of all tattoos in the the state of Georgia, “No Ragrets.”

Aside from the careless interception when down by 10 points late, the case for J.T. Daniels starts at the line of scrimmage. Four of Bennett’s 40 passes were batted down at the line last night (two by DL D.J. Dale and two by DL Christian Barmore), one of which directly resulted in an interception on the opening drive.

There is no doubt Bennett can lead the Dawgs to a nice season. Maybe he gets another shot at Alabama in Atlanta, but if Kirby wants to beat Bama, it may be time to hand the reigns of the offense over to five-star Southern Cal transfer, J.T. Daniels.

“Will you ever to lose to a former assistant”

Nick Saban:

pic.twitter.com/oEx2Ty4EKb

— George Jarjour (@GeorgeOnTap) October 18, 2020

Another victory for the Saban Industrial Complex.