Tennessee comes in with HUGE recruiting haul

After years of being terrible, Tennessee head coach Butch Jones has come in with just what the doctors in Knoxville ordered: A monster haul. By the end of National Signing Day, 32 players had signed up to be Volunteers (yeah, you read that right), much to even the biggest UT bloggers, who titled their National Signing Day post: “Where did all these bricks come from?” The answer is that Tennessee kicked butt and got signings in pretty early – including shoring up their defense with some excellent recruits. The biggest signings of these was safety Todd Kelly (59 on ESPN’s Top 300 list), OLB Dillon Bates (105), and DE Dewayne Hendrix (176). On the offensive side – and something that

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No Title? No problem! Bama’s No.1 on National Signing Day

No Championship? No problem for Nick Saban. The Alabama Crimson Tide was AGAIN the No.1 recruiting team on National Signing Day, with a tremendous signing day haul. It included: Three of the ESPN 300’s top 10 players (OT Cameron Robinson, DE Da’Shawn Hand, CB Tony Brown), and the No.10 and No.12 players in the nation, too (ATH Bo Scarborough, and CB Marlon Humphrey). They also stunningly picked up OLB Rashaan Evans from Auburn High school – who had also been rated highly, despite many thinking – including Auburn itself– that Evans was a cert to play in Jordan-Hare. The move seemed to have annoyed Evans’ mother, who seemed clearly worried about what people in the area would think. Saban described

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14 Last Minute SEC Head Coach Recruiting Pitches Before National Signing Day

Right, so National Signing Day’s tomorrow, which means that it’s Christmas for anyone who loves seeing if their school’s signing up some good talent. Why haven’t we gone more crazy on the recruiting front? It’s easy. I could get excited about a recruit, only for him to de-commit 400 times before making a decision, so I’d rather wait until National Signing Day. And then go crazy folks. Which I will do. Somewhere in the SEC, our head coaches are calling, texting, FBing and sexting recruits (OK, maybe not the last) in an effort to get them to come and play for their schools. As a unit, it’s worked: 80 commitments will be to SEC schools on Wednesday. But there’s still

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Nick Saban to Texas, Or Not?

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock or taking selfies at Nelson Mandela’s funeral, you’d probably heard the news and rumors that Nick Saban is leaving Alabama to become the new head coach at Texas. First of all Texas Longhorns website Orangebloods.com followed up a weekend of rumors that Saban was going to Texas by saying that UT coach Mack Brown was out. Brown himself said that he wasn’t leaving, saying that he was on a recruiting trip to Florida, telling Jimmy Burch at Horns247: “I’m in Florida recruiting. If I had decided to step down I sure wouldn’t be killing myself down here.” Now, a tweet from Stefan Stevenson of the Texas Star-Telegram said: “Source close to Texas executive

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By Damn! 2013 Ole Miss Rebels College Football Preview

2012 was an incredible season for Ole Miss, in the fact that they beat Mississippi State, won their bowl game, and they had a great recruiting class. Basically, that’s what you really need for Ole Miss fans, right? But what about 2013? Well, the ‘recruiting class of the ages’ – replete with defensive end Robert Nkemdiche (who – if you believe the reviews – is the second coming of Jadeveon Clowney) – has now touched down in Oxford, and will be strapping pads on and hitting people this September. Hugh Freeze’s team will be out to beat Dan Mullen’s Mississippi State again, and maybe score an upset victory over an LSU or Texas – both of whom are on a

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National Signing Day (SEC East): Florida rules, but Georgia, do we have a problem?

There might have been a lot of headlines out west about the National Signing Day classes that Alabama and Ole Miss put together, but guess what? Florida’s was pretty darned amazing. Will Muschamp has the reputation as one of the best recruiters in the land, and he proved it with an excellent class. However, there are some deep questions about Georgia to answer, folks… CHOMP! CHOMP! CHOMP! THE MUSCHAMP EFFECT Among other thoughts from UF brass, Will Muschamp was hired to Florida for two reasons: 1) He’s a great defensive coach 2) He’s a great recruiter. After a fantastic 2012-3 season (marred slightly by an ignominious loss to Louisville), Florida needed to add some more depth on both sides of

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National Signing Day Round-Up (SEC West): Ole Miss rules, but Alabama’s excellence shines

This year was yet another banner year for SEC recruiting, with every side A year ago, you would say that there was no way on God’s green earth that Ole Miss would have had a recruiting day like this one. But Hugh Freeze took over, took the team to an excellent year which included breaking a SEC losing streak, beating your biggest rival, taking LSU, Vanderbilt and Texas A&M to the last second, and thundering through a bowl game – as favorites. HUGH FREEZE FRIES IT UP IN OXFORD Well, there seems to be some belief about the Ole Miss program, because No.1 player in the nation – defensive tackle Robert Nkemdiche, plus highly-touted offensive tackle Laremie Tunsil, wide receiver

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Ten big questions for National Signing Day

Like everyone else, we at the SEC Football Blog are really, really excited about National Signing Day on February 6th. Sorry we haven’t been covering “firm”, “less firm”, “wavy”, or “de” commitments hugely this off-season, but these are mad times for recruits, and quite frankly, we’re happiest to sit and wait to see where the chips fall on February 6th – our first reminder that yes, college football will be back in a few weeks time with the Crimson/White/Red/Black/Blue/Orange/Purple/Green/Rainbow games in April, before getting to the fun times of players arrests and ejections from campus. Anyway, there IS the important time of Signing Day. With five SEC schools predicted to be in the Rivals.com Top 10, we anticipate that things

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Tennessee (Finally) Fires Derek Dooley

Tennessee fans today got the news that they weren’t surprised or shocked about: Derek Dooley has been fired as the Volunteers head coach. After his team was drilled 41-18 by Vanderbilt, Dooley was told that he wouldn’t be returning. And he wouldn’t even be asked to coach the team’s game against Kentucky, either. And to make matters worse, but buying out Dooley’s contract will cost Tennessee a cool $5 million (FIVE MIIIIILION DOLLARS!). Dooley’s highlights included (per The Clairon-Ledger): A 15-21 record A 0-15 record against ranked teams (we start to think what might have happened to Mark Richt if UGA hadn’t beaten Florida) An 0-7 SEC record this year, despite being a dark horse for the SEC East title

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Rogered: Tennessee WR Da’Rick Rogers suspended indefinitely

Huge news in Tennessee: Standout wide receiver Da’Rick Rogers has been suspended indefinitely by coach Derek Dooley for an unspecified violation of team rules, according to ESPN. It is not known what he did to gain such a suspension, although Bruce Feldman, college football reporter at CBS was told that it was a string of troubling incidents that prompted the staff to make the move. In one tweet he said: “After what I’d been told by sources inside Vols program last yr, was surprised Dooley allowed Da’Rick Rogers to stay w team.” He added: “In 2011 Da’Rick Rogers had a series of incidents, incldg a complete meltdown at UK gm that sources say COMPLETELY crossed line w UT staff.” And

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