Ole Miss and LSU Cruise; Alabama and South Carolina Snooze

Overall it’s been a pretty good bowl season for the SEC, going 5-2 with Florida left to play in the National Title Game. The highlights include Mississippi and Houston Nutt getting a resounding Cotton Bowl victory over Texas Tech and Vanderbilt winning their first bowl game since 1955. LSU had a very impressive performance in blowing out Georgia Tech while Kentucky and Georgia took care of business as well. The most shocking result for the conference came in the Sugar Bowl, where Alabama seemed to leave their heart in Atlanta (SEC Championship game loss to Florida) and did not show up to play against Utah. It was very surprising to see a Nick Saban-led team not be ready to compete in a big game, and Utah took it to the Tide all night. December was a rough month for Alabama, who lost their bid for an undefeated season against the Gators and then saw All-American left tackle Andre Smith ruled ineligible for the Sugar Bowl. Apparently Smith’s teammates weren’t very focused either as they showed up in New Orleans not ready to play the technically sound football that carried them to a 12-0 start.

Another squad who didn’t show up ready to compete in their Bowl game South Carolina, who was beaten soundly by Iowa. One question that has to be raised is what is the future of Steve Spurrier and the Gamecock program. South Carolina has not been able to crack the Top 3 in the SEC East for the last three seasons, and things don’t seem to be improving much in Columbia. Many SEC teams have gone younger in their coaching hires, and Spurrier has not been able to come close to any of the success he had in Gainesville in the 90’s. It will be a very interesting off-season to see if Spurrier can start getting the Gamecocks on a path to compete in the upper echelon of the SEC.
 

related tags

Read More...

Comments

Please login or you can to leave a comment.

If you aren't registered, Register Now to start leaving comments.