SB Nation - Aairon Savage

Talking Bowls and Reminiscing About The Good Ole Days

Jay Coulter — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 02:06:11 -0000

Georgia's Pat Dye (60) chases Auburn's Ed Dyas (38).

It's funny how your perspective can change. After all the success of the past 10 years, you wouldn't think Auburn fans would get excited about the bowl opportunities of a 7-3 team. I guess the old saying is true, "Absence makes the heart grow fonder." After a one year absence from the bowl scene, all of them look more inviting this year.

We are in the heart of bowl projection season and that means every national web site has a different projected path for bowl eligible teams. Today I looked at three projections for Auburn and came away with three different bowls.

The most interesting is over at al.com where one writer insists that an Auburn win over Georgia almost guarantees them a spot in the Cotton Bowl. In case you forgot, this is no longer your granddaddy's Cotton Bowl. For the first time, this year's contest will be played in the new billion dollar Cowboy Stadium in Dallas. Maybe there is more than bragging rights on the line this weekend.

Other projected paths show Auburn heading to the Outback, Liberty or Chick-Fil-A Bowls. While Dallas would be a cool stop, my vote is the Chick-Fil-A Bowl in Atlanta. It's close to home, it's played inside and you always get a great ACC opponent. My guess is all these projections are not worth the paper they are written on. Two blowout losses could land all of us in Legion Field hell eating bad pizza. But let's choose to remain optimistic.

It's hard to not think of Georgia's Vince Dooley and Auburn's Pat Dye when reminiscing about the Auburn-Georgia rivalry. For those of us middle age, this was the golden era of the rivalry. From 1980 through the end of the decade, there wasn't a better annual game than this one. The list of characters was a who's who of college greats with names like: Herschel Walker, Bo Jackson, Buck Belue, Brent Fullwood, Terry Hoague, Lionel James, Lindsey Scott and Tracy Rocker. The list could go on forever.

It's hard to believe that Dooley has been gone from the sidelines for more than 20 seasons and Dye is not far behind. Even after all these years, I still miss that cough of Pat Dye during his Thursday evening radio call-in show. It was must listen radio in the days before the internet.

Speaking of radio, I still haven't gotten over the loss of Jim Fyffe and Larry Munson doing Saturday afternoon games. Maybe I'm just getting older, but I doubt we'll ever see two greats like Munson and Fyffe again. How blessed we were to be able to listen. Auburn vs. Georgia will never be the same.

While the Iron Bowl may be the most important game of the season for Auburn fans, for 20 Auburn players Saturday is as big as it gets. Those players call the Peach state home and there's nothing they'd like more than to snap Georgia's three game winning streak. When Auburn takes the field, look for Georgia natives Mario Fannin (Hampton) and Darvin Adams (Kennesaw) to have a little extra bounce in their step. Speaking of Adams, he needs just two touchdown catches to pass Auburn great Terry Beasley for the single season touchdown reception record.

We've talked all week about the unique relationship Auburn and Georgia share. It would not be a stretch to say that both programs owe much, if not most of their success to those who graduated from the other school. Here's a list of this season's inbreeding courtesy of Auburn Sports Information:

Georgia assistant head coach/defensive line/recruiting coordinator Rodney Garner and UGA offensive line coach Stacy Searels were teammates with Auburn defensive line coach Tracy Rocker at Auburn. Garner and Rocker both played on the defensive line during the 1985-88 seasons, while Searels was an offensive lineman from 1984-87.

Garner starred at nose guard at Auburn alongside Rocker, earning All-SEC honors as a senior while Rocker won the Lombardi and Outland Trophies. Garner also served in various capacities at Auburn (recruiting coordinator/tight ends coach/ assistant strength and conditioning coach) from 1990-95.

Searels was a first-team All-American in 1987 and a two-time first-team All-SEC selection, before working as a G.A. coach at Auburn from 1992-93. He later coached with Rocker at Cincinnati in 2002, instructing the offensive line while Rocker coached the defensive line...

Georgia defensive co-coordinator/linebackers coach John Jancek coached the defensive line at Central Florida during Auburn head coach Gene Chizik's first season as UCF's defensive coordinator in 1998...

Auburn Football Operation Coordinator Scott Fountain started his college coaching career as an offensive graduate assistant at Florida State from 1994-96, while Georgia head coach Mark Richt was the offensive coordinator for the Seminoles. UGA tight ends coach John Lilly was also a G.A. coach at FSU in 1996 after serving as a videographer in 1995...

Georgia associate head strength and conditioning coach Keith Gray was a strength and conditioning graduate assistant at Auburn from 1997-99.

Auburn takes on Georgia Saturday night at 6 p.m. CT from Samford Stadium in Athens, Georgia. The Bulldogs enter the game as four-point favorites. The game will be carried live by ESPN 2. Announcers for the Deuce are Mark Jones and Bob Davie - God help us. War Eagle and have a great weekend!

Stack-Ups: Did Anybody Ever Tell You That You Look Like a Shorter, Clumsier Julio Jones?

Ivory Tower — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 12:00:49 -0000

Winning the SEC West requires a mixture of coaching, discipline, and luck. And to some extent, you just need to be better than everyone else in the Division. Or the really good team needs to be on probation at the moment. It's June, and that means here at RCR, we are just throwing words at the internet and seeing what sticks. Stack-Ups are what's sticking today.

Last week, we compared the SEC West's quarterbacks. And Gonzo was there in full force; so that was the bomb.

Today, we're all about that position that kinda sounds like "quarterback" when Larry Munson says it: cornerbacks (and safeties). DEFENSIVE BACKS!

ALABAMA

It is amazing - and indicative that the Tide is still quite talented - that when talking about Alabama, the punditry is not automatically talking about Javier Arenas. He is far more important to the Tide as a return man than as a cornerback, but for a guy that had 44 solo tackles (14 more than the more-heralded defender D.J. Moore at Vanderbilt) he ain't half bad at the day job. Justin Woodall brings back four interceptions. And Kareem Jackson is listed as a returning starter, as well at the other cornerback slot. Of course, these are the same guys that gave up 336 yards through the air to Utah, so only so much can be said for bringing back last year's guys. As a unit, these fellows return 9 interceptions, which is certainly a satisfactory number, if not electrifying. It's a group that has frustrating written all over it for Tide fans because, with all the experience returned, they are still going to give up big performances by the more challenging aerial attacks.

ARKANSAS

If everybody scored secondaries the way I score golf rounds, the 2008 Hog defensive backs would have a real argument that they were among the best in the SEC; nay the whole country. Instead, they finished tenth in the SEC and got lit the heck up by people like Mike Hartline, Tyson Lee, and whoever plays quarterback for UL-Monroe and Tulsa. (Full disclosure, the Rebels, don't forget, finished last in the SEC in pass defense, but we'll get to that in due time) This unit is full of guys whose middle name must be "If he can step up this season ..." and hopes of JUCO transfer production. Those JUCO's are named Anthony Leon and Rudell Crim (am I the only one who wishes Anthony Leon would transpose his name so that the Arkansas' secondary could be anchored by the very Arkansas-sounding tandem of "Leon and Rudell?"). It's not a top-flight squad, and adding insult to injury is that the guy about whom they ought to be most excited, Elton Ford, has been out since a neck injury in last year's game against Hootin' Dale.

AUBURN

Defensive backs, in keeping with a pretty respectable tradition on the plains, look to be the highlight of, perhaps, the whole team. The team leading tacklers last season, Mike McNeil and Zac Ethridge, are both still in school with eligibility (so, "returning" in one sense), but both missed time this spring with injuries (so, "returning" has something of a flexible timetable). Oh, and Jarraud Powers' replacement, senior Aairon Savage, is recovering from a knee injury. This is all to say that if the staff at Plains General Hospital can do for Auburn's safeties and cornerbacks what they haven't been able to do for Gregory House, the returning talent for what was a good Auburn defense ought to see an upgrade from "stable" to "wicked awesome."

LSU

Honorary Rebel Chris Low swears these guys will be better this year. And one thing, they don't lack is depth. Another thing they don't lack is coaching. Everybody seems to be a John Chavis fan; count me among the everybodies. Chavis moved their leading tackler from last year, Harry Coleman, from safety to linebacker. They're happy with Chad Jones at free safety and Patrick Peterson at cornerback. And, supposedly, Cornerback-to-Safety convert Ron Brooks is the class of this deep field. What's the storyline you keep hearing, though? Oh, yes, it's that, for all the hype, no one in this group was really a game-changer last year. Blue-faced professions of talent only go so far. The production on the field is yet to be seen.

MISSISSIPPI STATE

Ole Miss fans wish many happy returns to Derek Pegues, who parlayed a disappointing senior season into a disappointing draft day. But now he's gone, and nobody on this staff will be for State what Pegues as for the Maroon in 2007. Between their projected starters (Zach Smith and Charles Mitchell at Safety; Marcus Washington and Damien Anderson at Corner), there are just about 7 or 8 starts. I should also note that Jerrell Powe has infinitely more interceptions (1) than their projected starting secondary. I'm sure that, in reality, State's secondary will be serviceable (as it usually is) and, statistically, it might actually look semi-impressive (at some point teams will stop throwing the ball against them).

OLE MISS

In Oxford, for the first time in what seems like a long time, people aren't just talking about violations when they say "secondary." The defensive MVP of the Cotton Bowl, Marshay Green, looked good in spring practice. The Rebels have, I might say similarly to Alabama, solid experience at the position (if that experience was not all good). This unit was dead last in the conference in pass defense in 2008, and their solid performance in the Cotton Bowl may just have been the Dr. Jekyll to a more more prevalent Mr. Hyde. However, we can look to Kendrick Lewis, the second-leading tackler among Safeties in the SEC last year, to provide leadership along with Marshay. I expect moderate improvement.

WRAP-UP:

Every SEC West team ought to be a little tentative about calling its defensive backs "The Best in the West." Where some teams lack talent, they have experience. Where others lack experience, they have talent. And some teams might not have a whole lot of either. The punditry, though, seem pretty well agreed that LSU has too much depth, speed, and the leadership of old men not to turn things around and be a special unit. Who am I to disagree?

1. LSU

2. Auburn

3. Alabama

4. Ole Miss

5. Mississippi State

6. Arkansas