AJC > Sports > Blog > Archives > 2008 > September > 17
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Arizona State will be angry, desperate
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Nobody asked me but……
1. Arizona State will be angry, desperate: My friend Lee Corso always says that nothing makes a football team play harder than the twin feelings of urgency and redemption. For the second straight week Georgia will be facing a team that is a little desperate when the Bulldogs go to Arizona State.
Understand how important this game is to Arizona State and Dennis Erickson’s desire to put the Sun Devils back on the national stage. Their fans have been talking about this week’s game with Georgia for a long time. The game is one of the hardest sellouts the school has ever had. I talked folks in Phoenix last week who have been there for huge games with Southern Cal, Notre Dame, and Nebraska but have never experienced the buzz that exists for this visit from the Georgia Bulldogs.
Now I’m hearing from people who think that buzz has been greatly diminished with Arizona State’s loss to UNLV, which had lost 21 of its last 22 road games before beating the Sun Devils in overtime last Saturday. I disagree.
Arizona State may have lost a chance to have ESPN’s College Game Day on their campus for an entire Saturday, but now the football team goes from just highly motivated to angry and desperate with a lot to prove.
Georgia has a better team. But Georgia was the better team last week in Columbia. The Bulldogs had better be prepared to match Arizona State’s intensity at the beginning of this game. Because if Arizona State gets a cheap touchdown and gets a little momentum, Georgia might not be able to get it back.
2. This will be the fastest defense that Josh Nesbitt has seen: Last night I finally got a chance to watch the entire Georgia Tech-Virginia Tech game. Virginia Tech’s defense was pretty fast. Mississippi State’s is faster.
Mississippi State has some issues on offense but the defense is pretty good. After giving up 363 yards in a 22-14 loss at Louisiana Tech, the Bulldogs allowed only 148 yards against Southeastern Louisiana and give up only a field goal to Auburn. Safety Derek Pegues could play for any team in the country. The Bulldogs are, however, missing linebacker Jamar Chaney, who was lost for the year after suffering a broken ankle in the last play against Louisiana Tech.
After watching the Virginia Tech tape, it’s pretty clear that most defenses from this point on will concentrate on limiting the number of times Jonathan Dwyer and the rest of the B-backs get the pitch. That puts more pressure than ever on Nesbitt, whose window to make decisions will be even smaller on Saturday. Mississippi State’s defense will be the best one Nesbitt will see until the Yellow Jackets play Georgia at the end of the year.
3. Auburn has to be sandbagging on offense: I’ve been watching Tommy Tuberville’s teams a long time and it always seems like the Tigers kind of stumble around a week or two before they play a huge SEC game. The offense can’t possibly be as bad as it looked in the 3-2 win over Mississippi State.
Can it?
Last season Auburn lost back-to-back games to South Florida and Mississippi State in September so no one gave the Tigers a shot when they went down to No. 4 Florida. Auburn kicked a field goal at the buzzer to win 20-17. Tuberville has won 9 of his last 12 games against Top 10 teams. He has a knack of getting his teams ready for big games like these.
I’m working on a story on the Auburn offense for Friday’s paper where OC Tony Franklin takes all the blame. That’s what coaches are supposed to do. But something tells me that Tuberville and Franklin have been holding some things back and not showing all their cards because LSU is coming to town Saturday night.
Now I could be wrong. Auburn’s offense could be just that bad. But I don’t think so.
4. Tennessee can beat Florida-if it runs the ball: It seems that nobody outside of the state of Tennessee is giving the Volunteers a chance on Saturday when No. 4 Florida comes to Neyland Stadium. They look at Tennessee’s ugly overtime loss to UCLA, which then lost to BYU 59-0. Case closed.
But it’s never quite that simple. The Volunteers are playing at home and will feed off the energy of 107,000 fans. This is Florida’s first road trip of the season and a lot young players, as talented as they are, have yet to experience a big SEC game on the road.
None of this will matter if Tennessee tries to play Florida’s game. Tennessee’s success against Florida over the years has come when it remained true to its personality under Phillip Fulmer. The Volunteers have to use a veteran offensive line to run the ball to keep Florida’s offense off the field and limit Tim Tebow’s possessions. And another thing: If I’m John Chavis, the Tennessee defensive coordinator, I am not going to let Tebow beat me running the football.
If Tennessee tries to match Florida’s speed and skill level, the Volunteers will get embarrassed as they were last year (59-20) in Gainesville.
5. Arkansas could lose the rest of its games: I know this will not break a lot of hearts in this town, but first year coach Bobby Petrino is looking at a very sobering schedule from this point on. Because of Hurricane Ike, last week’s game at Texas was moved to Sept. 27. So the rest of the Arkansas schedule, starting with Saturday’s home game with No. 9 Alabama goes like this: at No. 7 Texas (2-0), No. 4 Florida (2-0), at No. 10 Auburn (3-0), at Kentucky (3-0), Ole Miss (2-1), Tulsa (2-0), at South Carolina, at Mississippi State, No. 6 LSU (2-0) in Little Rock.
I’m just asking: Where are the wins on that schedule for a team that had to rally late in the fourth quarter to beat Western Illinois and Louisiana-Monroe? You have to figure the Hogs are going find a couple of wins somewhere. I’m just not quite sure where they are.
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