News From Around the SEC
By Sam Scott
Here’s your Around the SEC roundup for this week. While it has been a slower week of news, there are several interesting items necessary to be covered. Here we go:
It’s that time again! You can take this however you want, but Florida taking an early 2012 Fulmer Cup lead just seems right, doesn’t it? (Bonus points go to head coach Will Muschamp for continuing the tradition that started with Urban Meyer: arrests all offseason, every offseason.) Current standings are here, where Florida is now tied with Georgia and…New Mexico? Maybe Mike Locksley never left.
A helpful reminder. SEC silly season is exactly that – silly, and darn near impossible to keep up with. So if you’re like me and you need to keep track of all these coaching changes, Team Speed Kills has you covered.
Recruiting rankings DO matter. Well, in a way, they do. Mr. SEC evaluates recruiting rankings over the past decade and finds that while rankings may not exactly pan out for one individual team, they seem to correlate with the on-field success of the top tier of the league. (Side note: seeing Tennessee at 4th overall with an SEC record of 22-26 hurts. Badly.)
Excuse me, but NINETEEN games? Yes, a nineteen-game conference schedule is in consideration for the SEC basketball season. No, the sanity of those who have proposed the schedule has not been confirmed.
Speaking of silly season… Auburn has found a new offensive coordinator, and while he hasn’t committed to a certain style of offense yet, it looks like the excitement of the spread may be gone for some time. If he follows the same pattern of his offense this year at Temple, Auburn will be in a one-back offense running the ball 75 percent of the time. The head coach at Temple is Steve Addazio, so take it for what it’s worth, but…yeah, that’s ugly.
Non-SEC related, but it’s worth your time. Spencer Hall of Every Day Should be Saturday is the best writer you’ve never heard of. His article on Joe Paterno is some of the absolute best writing I’ve seen in months and regardless of your opinion on the coach, it’s well-worth the read.
Cuonzo preaches patience. The fact he’s having to do this in his first season as the head coach is honestly infuriating to me just because it really isn’t necessary to anyone who knows much at all about what he’s instilled in the team already, but sometimes fans lose perspective and forget that you can’t make much of anything out of a team as devoid of talent (aside from Jarnell Stokes and Jeronne Maymon) as this year’s Tennessee squad. As is with Tennessee football, though, most fans are willing to give him time to rebuild the program.
Number of the week: 5. As in the amount of SEC teams currently projected to make the NCAA Tournament in Joe Lunardi’s latest bracket on ESPN.
Last night’s Basketball scores: Vanderbilt 65, Tennessee 47.
The schedule for the rest of the week:
Wednesday – LSU at #16 Mississippi State, 8:00 PM ET, SEC Network/ESPN3
Alabama at South Carolina, 8:00 PM ET, SEC Network/ESPN3
Auburn at Arkansas, 9:00 PM ET, CSS
Thursday – #13 Florida at Ole Miss, 7:00 PM ET, ESPN2
Saturday – #16 Mississippi State at #13 Florida, 1:30 PM ET, SEC Network/ESPN3
Arkansas at Alabama, 1:30 PM ET, SEC Network/ESPN3
Middle Tennessee at Vanderbilt, 2:00 PM ET, no TV
#1 Kentucky at LSU, 4:00 PM ET, SEC Network
Auburn at Tennessee, 6:00 PM ET, ESPN2
South Carolina at Ole Miss, 7:00 PM ET, FS Tennessee