Tag: SEC Championship

Has the ‘Alabama mystique’ gone?

The news that safety sensation Caleb Downs and starting offensive lineman Kadyn Proctor put themselves into the transfer portal a few days after the retirement of Nick Saban and the rehiring of Kalen DeBoer has made a lot of people ask the question: ‘Has the Alabama mystique gone?” Saban had the mystique – in the same way as any long-tenured, high-winning head coach (see Mssrs Bryant, Paterno, Spurrier, Meyer, Hayes, Schembechler and Smart for details) – does. When a team wins and wins and wins and wins and wins in the way that Alabama did under Saban’s time, it gets the reputation as a development factory for the NFL. Saban dined out on this while recruiting (He used to say:

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SEC SCHEDULE FOR 2024 RELEASED

The SEC released their new, Texas and OU-expanded schedule. There are a lot of interesting games, and a lot of dullards. A lot of SEC fans have talked about Texas v Oklahoma being an exiting game because it’s now a S-E-C game, but if you weren’t excited about that match-up every year anyway, then you’re probably ignorant. The great thing about this schedule is that there are some cracker non-conference match-ups, including Texas going to Michigan, Florida v Miami, LSU v USC, Georgia v Clemson and Alabama’s trip to Wisconsin, as well as and an underrated monster in Arkansas going to Oklahoma State. There are a lot of non-conference match-ups we hate that the SEC produces every week, but in

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Texas A&M hires Mike Elko: How will he fare?

Mike Elko has been announced as the head coach of Texas A&M. The former Duke head coach (where he guided the Blue Devils to back-to-back bowl appearances, something rarely seen in Raleigh) returns to College Station, where he was defensive co-ordinator under Jimbo Fisher before his departure. There was a celebratory press conference, filled with good graces and an Aggie War Hymn in front of about 200 Aggies fans who obviously had nothing better to do with their time came on Monday afternoon. “There’s not many times when you go into the first team meeting and 50 of the players come up and give you a big hug and welcome you back,” Elko told the party. “But then I think

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Week 11: Ain’t a lot on your SEC register

I hate this weekend in the SEC. It’s basically a tune-up weekend that should have happened at the start of the season, but somehow it happens before ‘Rivalry Week’ at the end of the year. The Chatanooga – Alabama, Louisiana Monroe – Ole Miss, New Mexico State – Auburn games aren’t interesting at all. Saturday’s coverage of Abilene Christian’s trip to Texas A&M and Southern Miss at Mississippi State will basically be a load of commentators gossiping about the well-paid departures of Mssrs Fisher and Arnett. And LSU’s Jayden Daniels will put up video-game numbers against mighty Georgia State. That’s your preview for that one, folks. Oh, and Arkansas is still a 29.5 point favorite over FIU, even if this

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Mississippi State fires Zach Arnett

Mississippi State has fired head coach Zarch Arnett after just 11 games. He finished with a 5-6 record but an awful 1-6 in the SEC this year, where the only highlight was a 7-3 victory over Arkansas (who might lose their head coach soon too!). Arnett was paid $3 million. He’ll still be owed $4.5 million – chump change compared to the amount owed to Jimbo Fisher at Texas A&M – half of what is left on its deal, according to MSU’s 247 page. The former defensive coordinator had one of the hardest jobs in college football this year – coming in after the death of head coach Mike Leach, who passed away in December. Honestly, he should never have

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So who’s gonna be next for Texas A&M?

Now Jimbo’s been pushed out of the door at Texas A&M, immediately tongues are wagging about who’s next up. Here are our runners and riders, with Duke’s Mike Elko seemingly the run away fan favorite. THE FAVORITE Mike Elko: Has turned around Duke from a national joke to a ACC competitor, which has included a win over Clemson this year. Currently 15-8 in Raleigh. Was a great defensive coordinator in College Station. Defenses average 25th in the country between 2018-2021. More importantly, wasn’t fired by Fisher. WHO SHOULD GET A CALL Brian Hartline: Ohio State is a bigger job than Texas A&M, and all he’s done in his time at Ohio State is recruit talent. Puts endless amount of wide

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Jimbo Fisher out at Texas A&M

Jimbo Fisher has been fired at Texas A&M. He will be taking $76m with him, with a $20m due within the first month of termination, and then he gets a $7m annuity over next 7 years. He might be touchable during that time. The writing was on the wall “They won’t fire him, the buyout’s too big”, boosters told me over and over again last year after another moribund offensive performance – particularly against a they-turned-out-to-be-awful Appalachian State team. To be honest, it was the 38-22 win over LSU at the end of last season that probably saved his job. If they had lost that, Texas A&M would have been looking for a head coach last autumn. By the start

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SEC Preview: It’s Cocktail Party time!

It’s that time of year again, when drunk visored dudes in red bark at fans in jean shorts wearing orange and blue at The Landing in Jacksonville. The jorted ones then give ’em the chomping motion, and yell ‘Gator Bait’. The visored one, who’s a 50 year old who has a hairdo like Kirby Smart and sells insurance, then takes a swing at the dude in orange and blue because he thinks the dude’s talking about his daughter. They grapple, and then fall over in the street, rolling in cigarette butts, sweat and probably urine. But the actual Cocktail Party at TIAA Bank Field this year between Georgia and Florida clash isn’t meant to be any sort of fight. It’s

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SEC Rankings: The SEC West is a head ****

People talk about the Big Ten East as being the ‘crazy conference’, with Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State all battling it out for supremacy. The first leg of that is already done, with Ohio State proving that having NFL-talent wide receivers and a stout defense will tend to win more big ballgames than lose them when they beat Penn State 20-12 in a game that wasn’t that close. But the SEC West, dear Lord, could be even worse. Here’s why (if LSU beats Alabama): LSU beats Alabama who beat Ole Miss who beat LSU who beat Alabama. In other words, a 3-way tie at the top. All three teams don’t look like losing again anytime soon….yet Alabama play LSU

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Week 8 SEC Preview and Predictions (and some others too!)

It’s a relatively quiet week in the SEC, with only 4 SEC match-ups and out-of-conference v SEC game. Headlining it is Alabama v Tennessee, with South Carolina’s trip to Missouri, Ole Miss’ trip to Auburn, and a bottom-feeder-for-the-SEC-West clash between Mississippi State and Arkansas (which should be stuck on on the Pac-12 Network, let alone the SEC Network) coming along behind. Oh, and LSU hosts Army, which would have been a cool match-up, erm, last year. So as a special treat, we’re doing a brief  preview of three non-conference match-ups between ranked teams, including Penn State’s trip to Ohio State, Duke v Florida State, and Utah v USC – a match-up that looked a lot spicier before the season started.

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