Tennessee beat Kentucky this weekend for the 32nd time in 34 tries and Jeremy Pruitt has the entirety of Vol Nation behind him. Let's just start with that....
Jeremy Pruitt is the only active SEC
coach to beat two ranked teams in his first season
It’s
been a mixed bag so far for the 2018 Vols, but here they are at 5-5 with a chance to
win out, go to a bowl game, and finish with 8 wins, which would make Pruitt the
first Vol head coach to have 8 victories in his first year since…Phillip Fulmer. And
we all know how that turned out. So there’s a lot to feel good about on Rocky
Top at the moment.
The
only gripes I’d have with Pruitt's tenure thus far would be him getting choked up
at the podium over Tennessee’s “fight” after they lost by 26 to Georgia (which
was funny but dumb. Saban would’ve never done that), and that they blew a 12
point second half lead to South Carolina two weeks ago. Everything else that’s
happened this season pretty much makes sense.
And
when compared to Butch, he looks like the second coming of Saban with how he’s
handled himself in the job. He’s just way better at the coach speak without
beating you over the head with it the way Coach Jones used to. There’s no “brick by brick” or “leadership
reps” or “Champions of Life” to speak of, just the same consistent “We’ve got a
lot to work on” message each and every week from him. If anything, the reason
him getting choked up at the podium after Georgia was so weird was because he
hardly ever shows much joy in front of the camera. We always praise Saban for
never being satisfied and hardly ever smiling, and I don’t think that’s a bad
quality for a coach to have, particularly at a place like Tennessee where the
media is ruthless and the fan base has higher expectations year to year than
the administration, team, or coaching staff has for themselves.
Here’s
another fun stat: it took Butch Jones 31 games before he beat two ranked teams,
while Pruitt has done it in just 10.
Not
breaking any news here, but winning really matters at Tennessee. That’s why we
all feel really good about Pruitt this morning. The fan base isn’t going to
want to hear about “we’re building something, I swear!” for the next three
years. They want championships, top ten rankings, victories over rivals, and to
feel like the program is back on track and trending in the right way again.
They want to beat Florida and Alabama, and maybe even do it in consecutive
years! That’s Pruitt’s task. Things, at least for the moment, are trending that
way.
Is Louisville going to be the best
job opening in college football?
With
the Cardinals dumping Bobby Petrino yesterday, we now have two Power 5 jobs
currently open, the other being Kansas, which is an abominable job in a program
that hasn’t been relevant since Mark Mangino got himself fired almost a decade ago. Here’s the
thing though, unless Jeff Brohm leaves Purdue for Louisville (his alma mater),
I don’t see any other better jobs opening up by the end of the season (unless some FSU boosters get
together and frame Willie Taggart for soliciting prostitution, and don’t rule
that out). Urban Meyer looks worse than an actual train wreck on the sidelines,
but he seems extremely determined to continue to coach, while Auburn seems locked
in to Gus Malzahn solely because he has a $30+ million buyout (hell, maybe some
of the Auburn boosters should be getting together and figuring out a way to
ship copious amounts of illegal drugs to Malzahn’s home).
Kliff
Kingsbury at Texas Tech seems like a reasonable “get the hell out of town”
candidate. He’s got a low buyout (like $5 million) and he’s hardly won anything
(35-38 overall, 19-33 in the Big 12, and only one season with more than 7
wins), except there’s been almost no buzz to this point about him getting the
axe. Plus, they couldn’t fire the most beautiful man in the history of college
athletics, could they? Just look at this face!
We’re
all just waiting to see what happens with Clay Helton at USC. The Trojans are
abominable right now, Helton is a door-to-door used tube sock salesman, and he’s
proven himself to be a below average coach without Sam Darnold playing
quarterback for him. Their performance against Cal on Saturday night was
atrocious; they blew a 14 point halftime lead thanks to dumb penalties and asinine play calling. They have no momentum in the already crowded LA sports scene, and I don’t know
what the point of bringing him back for another year would be, unless they’re
just looking around and thinking “where are all the great candidates?” Because
that’s the thing, there aren’t any home runs out there right
now. I think Dino Babers has done a phenomenal job at Syracuse, but he’s in his
late 50s, and let’s be honest, his name makes him sound like he’s an actual dinosaur
or a Flintstone’s character. He ain’t winning the press conference anywhere. Lane
Kiffin? He already got fired at USC and has a literal mile of baggage. Matt Campbell at
Iowa State is probably the best up and comer at the moment, but he’s never been at a place with the pressure like USC either. Plus, Helton’s buyout, while there’s no official
number, is somewhere over $10 million. So it’s not cheap to get rid of him, all of which makes me think the Trojans are going to roll it back another year with
him, a 2019 season that will see them go 6-6 or 5-7, with the same toilet bowl
offense and dumb penalties and overall sloppiness.
Side
note: I have no idea where it all went wrong at Louisville for Petrino. I don’t think that’s
a great job or an extremely easy place to win, but Petrino had a
Heisman-winning quarterback and a team that lost to the eventual national
champion Clemson Tigers on the road by only a few yards back in 2016 and somehow turned it into a program that went 10-16 over his final 26 games there.I mean, they lost six of their seven ACC
games this year by 18 points or more! In the worst Power 5 conference of all time!
Frankly, I think Petrino survives this
awful year if he wasn’t such a slime ball. He was former AD Tom Jurich’s guy,
not the current administrations, and I think the affair/motorcycle accident,
the lies, and the double crossings that have become a Petrino staple this century
all caught up to him this year. He’s not unlike Greg Schiano in the fact that he’s
not a good enough football coach to survive with as much baggage as he has.
I’ve been right about Will Muschamp
this entire time, dammit!
The
fact that Muschamp is 7-0 against the Vols almost gives me a concussion every
time I think about it. He’s the most “middle school football coach” of all the
current college football coaches we have, and Saturday’s catastrophe against
Florida is going to be on his South Carolina tombstone when he gets fired
sometime next season. To blow a 17 point second half lead to that Gator team,
one that starts Feleipe Franks at quarterback, a guy I’m not even sure can
complete ten yard passes consistently, is mind boggling to me. It was so bad
that they probably should’ve left Muschamp at the Gainesville airport.
I
may not have ever been more right on anything sports-related in my entire life.
Muschamp, like he did at Florida, is a guy who pops in his second year at a
place, only to turn around and have his stock torpedo less than a full season later. The
Gamecocks are going to get blasted by Clemson in two weeks and Muschamp is
going to enter 2019 on perhaps the hottest seat in America outside of Clay
Helton.
And
for the love of god Jeremy Pruitt, can you please, please, please figure out a
way to beat this clown next season? Please? The only thing that makes less sense
than Muschamp’s 7-0 record against the Vols is that anyone would ever agree to
date me.
What should I make of Clemson?
The
Tigers whipped Boston College in 40 degree weather and now have the easiest
path of any of the remaining contenders to the playoff. Before Saturday’s
demolition, they’d beaten their last four ACC opponents by an average of 51
points. Look, I’ve not been on the bandwagon with this team all year, but they
haven’t really been challenged by anyone since September and could roll
into the playoff without having any opponent within 20 points of them the final
two months of the season. They’ve got an NFL defensive line, and while Trevor
Lawrence looks like Ronny “Sunshine” Bass with a much larger, airstrip-size
nose, he’s certainly brought an explosive element to the offense that was
missing when Kelly Bryant was the quarterback.
Of
course, the fly in the ointment of their 2018 season is that the ACC
has been the worst Power 5 league, maybe ever. Clemson is obviously good and Syracuse
has a very good coach, but everyone else is awful. N.C. State was ranked 14th
this week for some reason and lost to Wake Forest. B.C. lost their quarterback
early against Clemson and then couldn’t move the ball the rest of the night,
though I’m not sure it would’ve mattered who started for them anyway because they looked completely outclassed most of the night. Alabama,
Michigan, Notre Dame, Oklahoma, and Georgia would’ve all rolled through this
schedule without any blemishes, meaning I think the Tigers can’t afford to lose
and make the playoff. But I’ll still bump them up to the precipice of my Top 4 this
week.
Teams still alive for the playoff
Like
always, every Group of Five team is eliminated automatically because they aren’t
deserving, as well as every two loss team from the Power 5 (* by the undefeated
teams). None of the contenders lost this week so we should still have 9 teams
left.
SEC:
*Alabama, Georgia
Big
Ten: Michigan, Ohio State
Big
12: Oklahoma, West Virginia
ACC:
*Clemson
Pac
12: Washington State
Independents:
*Notre Dame
We
have the potential for things to really get messy here, because there’s a
chance each of the Power 5 leagues has a one loss conference champ, which means
that as many of three of them could end up being left out, depending on how the
rest of the season shakes out. I’m fine with leaving Oklahoma/West Virginia
out, by the way, even if they finish with just one loss, because like I’ve said
before, they play in a pillow fight conference where people sometimes run into
each other. I’m sorry, I realize your offense is great OU, but you’ve given up 94 points and 1,113 yards of offense the
last two weeks to Texas Tech and Oklahoma State. Washington State is a great story, and I’d like nothing more
than a month of Mike Leach press availability, but they don’t measure up in the
eye test compared to some of the other contenders.
‘Bama
shouldn’t play a beaten up Tua this week against the Citadel because they could
win that game starting a middle schooler at quarterback. I know Jalen Hurts
probably can’t play either, so this would be the game where we line up in the
Power I and hand it off about 70 times. Tua not being able to play makes any
game against the Tide significantly easier if you're a good Power 5 team, and they can't afford to not have him the rest of the season if they want to win the title. He's the one that makes them the dominant, dynamic team that no one can come within 22 points of. You take him out of there, and while they'd still be incredible, they're much more beatable, particularly if Hurts's injury continues to make it look like his feet are made out of glass when he runs.
What
would the committee do if Notre Dame, Clemson, and Michigan win out AND Georgia
beats Alabama in the SEC title game? Would they leave 1 loss but non-conference champ ‘Bama out? Maybe? Or
would they bump one loss conference champ Michigan, whose only loss was by seven
on the road to Notre Dame all the way back in Week 1? And how mad would the
administrators in the Big Ten be if that happened? Or the Big 12 and Pac 12,
who would find themselves out of the playoff for the third time in five years?
Which
is why this thing is going to go to a six or eight team thing sooner rather
than later. If you like the four team playoff, I’m sorry, but that’s just the way
it’s going to be. These conferences aren’t going to be okay with their champions
consistently being left out. How do you think the SEC fans would react if their
champion got left out one year? You want college football Civil War? Because that's how you get a college football Civil War.
Regardless,
if the current Top 4 all win out (and I think they will), that’ll be our playoff
and it won’t matter all that much what happens behind them. Our most likely
loser? I think Notre Dame could lose in Yankee Stadium this weekend to Syracuse
and make everything more chaotic, not less, while Michigan has Ohio State in
Columbus the final weekend of the season. I’ve been on record the last few
weeks that the Wolverines are going to beat them by three touchdowns, but they’ve
also been the little brother in that rivalry the last decade and half, and OSU
will still probably be in the playoff hunt that week too. Plus, it might be the
biggest rivalry in all of sports; they aren’t just going to roll over for them.
My Playoff Four
Alabama
The
Tide shut out Mississippi State 24-0 and haven’t given up any points since the
3rd quarter of the Tennessee game. It’s also their first back to
back shutouts against FBS opponents in the Saban era. If Tua is healthy, it’s going
to be hard for anyone to come within two touchdowns of them.
Michigan
The
Wolverines blasted Rutgers this week 42-7 (not a surprise) and extended their
streak of not giving up over 300 yards to seven games. They (and MAYBE Clemson)
are the only defense in the country that I think could give Tua a little bit of
trouble.
Notre
Dame
The
Irish blasted FSU by 29 without starting quarterback Ian Book. Syracuse will be
a difficult test this week at Yankee Stadium.
Georgia
The
‘Dawgs rushed for 303 yards on Saturday against Auburn, and shouldn’t face a
serious test until the SEC Championship Game against ‘Bama in a few weeks.
I’d
have Clemson fifth and Oklahoma sixth, only because the Sooner offense is
incredible and Kyler Murray is the fastest person I’ve ever seen at the
quarterback position.
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