Pictures of the Week: Winning is like, better than losing

Photos courtesy of Jim Hipple.

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LSU in photos: The Defense

All photos courtesy of Jim Hipple.

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Missouri Game kickoff and network set

The SEC has released the schedule for October 12th. The Dawgs will take on Missouri at noon in ESPN's national game.

With UF at LSU a near mortal lock for the CBS game, I figured ESPN would be choosing which game between us and Texas A&M at Ole Miss would be the noon national game. Unfortunately, they came up with that game for the 8:30 kickoff on ESPN.

Full weekend SEC schedule:

Network	Time	Game
ESPN	12 p.m. ET	Missouri at Georgia
SEC TV	12:21 p.m. ET	South Carolina at Arkansas
PPV	2 p.m. ET	Western Carolina at Auburn
CBS	3:30 p.m. ET	Florida at LSU
ESPN2	7 p.m. ET	Alabama at Kentucky
FSN	7:30 p.m. ET	Bowling Green at Mississippi State
ESPN	8:30 p.m. ET	Texas A&M at Ole Miss

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-Missouri Tickets

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Murray and Marshall garner SEC Player of the Week honors

Murray as offensive player; Marshall at special teams.

Yes, Georgia has a special teams player of the week.

Congrats to two Damn Good Dawgs.
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LSU Game in Pictures: The Offense

All photos are courtesy of Jim Hipple. 

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Mad Props to the Student Section

Seriously, all y'all brought the pain. Just a spectacular showing. For what has to be fixed about the down market games, you got it right this week.

All of you are Damn Good Dawgs.
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PS. And some alumni were standing up during the game, too!

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Sunday Morning Comes: LSU

Yeah, I know it is Monday morning, but between Saturday's epic tailgate and all the folks we had over for brunch on Sunday that turned into a full on day long mimosa fest....

Any way, I was way wrong about stopping LSU's run game. We did a great job slowing it down. We forced Mett into having to beat us. He nearly did. However, Murray decided to put cement on top of the grave that the 'Murray can't win the big game' meme was in with a 75 yard drive to win the game.

I tweeted this was the best game I've ever seen at Sanford Stadium. I still believe that. While there have been games that we might have played a more complete game in, there wasn't one that was more exciting, with the crowd in it from the beginning, with the ending like we saw. Just spectacular.

1. The offensive line is back. At least for a game. Murray didn't get sacked. We ran for 196 yards. LSU came in with 7 sacks. They left with 7 sacks. All that against a very good Dline. They are really coming together. At least for a game.
2. So, about the defense, part one. I couldn't have asked for better run protection. Hill got his 4.3 ypc, but with the sacks, LSU ends up with just 77 yards of rushing. Josh Harvey-Clemson, Ramik Wilson, Floyd, Matthews. Garrison Damn Smith. Welcome to the future of Georgia's defense. Except for the zone toss. They ate our lunch in goal line situations with that play. Damn. 
3. So, about the defense, part two. And then the passing defense, right? Swann looked completely lost at times. Not sure what is going on there, but he looked worse than Langley, and it wasn't close. That drag play had too many line backers chasing and not enough covering. Our zone coverage looks broken. We end up with guys going the wrong direction, we don't play physical enough coming off the line, especially on big WRs. Our best play on obvious passing downs, right now, is to bring the house in the pass rush and force the QB to make a rushed throw. Give a QB like Mett time, he'll find a seam or something. Thankfully, we don't play another QB that good for a while. Regretfully, our pass D can make an average QB look pretty good. Oh, but we did cover the wheel route, so we have that going for us.
4. Aaron Murray shouldn't be missing D line men dropping into coverage. Two of his three INTs are due to linemen dropping into coverage. 
5. Special Teams are Special. If you had LSU muffing a punt, us hitting a 55 yard FG, and Beckham only getting one kick past the 30, while we didn't do any thing to help them with Special Teams, raise your hand. Yeah, you are lying.
6. What happened to our fullbacks? No really. What happened?

The crowd was a loud as I've heard. Ever. Just an incredible game. I'll have more on the defense later in the week, by the way. 

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Terrapin Brewery's solution to the water war with Tennessee

Is to make a beer called the 35th parallel. Yeah, so some brewer in Knoxville is teaming with them. I'm pretty sure they'll claim it was their idea, too.

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Dawgs move to 6th in USA Today and AP Polls

Good news: the Dawgs moved up over two undefeated teams, and beat another. There is still a significant gap between UGA and Stanford at fifth. Stanford and Oregon have to play yet, but Clemson and Ohio State are sitting up there without compelling schedules. Look for Georgia and Louisville to flip flop based on how each team handles games over the next few weeks.

Georgia's next chance to move up will be in Jacksonville, absent Missouri being much better as the season goes on. All Louisville can do is keep piling points on cupcakes.

For now, let's just focus on continuing to win.
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UGA vs. Tennessee kickoff set for 3:30 on CBS

With the UGA win, CBS decided to grab the Big 12 in SEC clothing game for their game of the week, at least back engineering from this.

This Sat: LSU/Miss St 7pmET ESPN; Arkansas:Florida 7pm ESPN2; Ole Miss/Auburn 7pm ESPNU. @SEC_Logo
— Keri Potts (@MsPotts_ESPN) September 29, 2013

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-Tennessee tickets

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Hyperbole T-Shirt

While I like the bravado, I think it is early for this.
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The Lane Kiffin Experience

Hat tip to @sarahchristine. This is awesome.

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Murray named Walter Camp Player of the Week

Big Game Fail meme fail.

After leading #UGA to a 44-41 victory over #6 LSU, Aaron Murray has been named Walter Camp National Player of the Week
— Bruce Feldman (@BFeldmanCBS) September 29, 2013

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Mark Fox joins Spike Squad

I've been clear on my position about Mark Fox. I also have to give credit where it is due. If you didn't see this yesterday:

(courtesy of Yahoo!)

then you missed out. 

That is 100% pure awesome. I've long thought Fox needed to engage students (and others) in Dawg Nation more. This is a huge first step in doing that. Get the students on your side, then Stegeman can rock, even with the home schedule we are facing this season.

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Saturday was Best Football Day

Yesterday was a perfect storm of awesome. Beautiful weather. Great crowd. Terrific tailgate atmosphere. When I got to campus about 6:30, there were people lined up like they were giving away booze. Crazy. I'll have more on the crowd later, but mad props to the students for showing up way early and leading the stadium's atmosphere.

I had friends trying to get tickets that said the price never fell below $150, if you could find anyone with tickets for sale. That was after kickoff. Just a nuts market. As hard as the 2008 Alabama game, at least.

Also, to my LSU bros, thanks for keeping your crap together. The LSU invitees at our tailgate were gracious, fun, and most importantly, didn't smell of corn dogs. No one got out of line, even at the game. Besides their attempts to infect our food and set up with LSU themed items, they were as fun and friendly as you could hope. I hate that I had to throw away all those paper towels, the food, and cups, but I did give you fair warning that was going to happen if you put that crap on my table.

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Quick thoughts on a Sunday

I'll have more later, but there were three things that stood out to me:

1. I was wrong about Mett's ability to carry LSU. See below about Georgia's defense, but he did enough to keep LSU in the game. His throws on consecutive 3rd and 20+ backed against the goal line were just nuts.
2. Our defense isn't ready for prime time.
3. GameDay has nothing to do with Georgia's success of lack thereof in these games. That is all.

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UGA vs. LSU Score T-Shirt

Defense is over rated.

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Better that smelling corndogs

Awesome. Courtesy of Bassindawg.

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LSU is here

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Commit to the G

I haven't been this excited about a tailgate and game in a long time. Get your asses over here.

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There is no Plan B

As the coffee perks, a couple of last minute thoughts:

• It would be glorious if this is like that 2004 game.
• I'm getting more an more excited about Murray working against LSU's DBs.
• I'm getting more and more nervous about Hill and the middle of our line.
• I'm sure you've seen, but the GameDay guest pickers at Bubba Watson and some dude from West Monroe, LA. 

Bring it loud for Paul Oliver. RIP.

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3 Questions: LSU

1. Can we slow down LSU's run game? Jeremy Hill can be a game changer. His performance against Auburn (25 rushes for 184 yards) was quite impressive. However, Auburn committed to stopping the run. Hill had 38 yards in the second half on 11 runs. There is no mistaking that little stat changed a 21-0 blow out to a 35-21 game that had LSU relying on the clock running out.
2. Will we screw up something in special teams? We can't give up two special teams TDs and win this game. We can't give up long returns. We can't miss FGs. We can't botch punt snaps. We can't botch FG snaps. We can't miss recovering onside kick attempts. 
3. Will our crowd make a difference? We've been in a couple of these games already this season. The closest LSU has been to that is the season opening game at Jerry World against TCU. TCU is a good team and the crowd was semi-pro TCU, but this is the first true test for Mett's ability to handle adversity, the LSU defense to adjust to a quick strike defense, and LSU's ability to deal with a loud road stadium. Georgia's had to do all of that is some shape or form this season already. 

I feel good about our chances tomorrow. We have to slow down their rushing game. If we make LSU put the game in the hands of Mett and LSU's passing game, we'll end up winning. If we can't, look for it to be like the Clemson game.

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UGA Baseball schedule released

We open with Georgia Southern and play at FSU, have a series with Clemson, and open SEC play at Foley with CWS finalist Mississippi State. The annual Georgia Tech match up at Turner Field is scheduled for May 13.

The Dawgs will also play Kennesaw State at Cool Ray in Gwinnett on April 22. We face MSU, South Carolina, Texas A&M, Kentucky, and Tennessee at home.
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Get your Fat Guy Touchdown picks in

Georgia Tech's game tonight is on our list. Get you picks in.
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Thursday game in the Fat Guy Touchdown pick'em

Don't forget to get your picks in. Georgia Tech's game is in the pool.
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Murray or Mett: Who would you rather?

I'm at a conference, so my posting is brief, but the question keeps coming up. Clearly, I have a favorite, but who would YOU rather have?
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SEC Power Poll, week four

The weekly poll is out. Nothing to see here. Other than Ole Miss making a move on Florida, and LSU eating into Alabama's first place votes.

I'd expect this weekend to have a great deal of bearing on that.
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Fat Guy Touchdown Standings

Clearly, I've got to pick tougher games. 16 people with perfection. 16. Hell, three folks had the same final score. Props to ugakerri, wedflatrock, and rolson for nearly getting the final score right.

STANDINGS for WEEK 4

Rank	Selection Name	Standings Adjustment	W-L	Pts	Tie Breaker Game 21-45
1	ugakerri	Adj	12-0	78	17-45**
1	wedflatrock	Adj	12-0	78	17-45
1	rolson	Adj	12-0	78	17-45
1	crafdog	Adj	12-0	78	10-45
1	Chris In Vegas	Adj	12-0	78	10-45
1	BulldogBrock	Adj	12-0	78	10-45
1	mackeraldreams	Adj	12-0	78	17-48
1	engrdawg06	Adj	12-0	78	17-42
1	CarltonJ34	Adj	12-0	78	17-41
1	ChiliDawg	Adj	12-0	78	17-52
1	uganewt	Adj	12-0	78	17-52
1	hoeilaartdawg	Adj	12-0	78	13-52
1	dabears42	Adj	12-0	78	3-34
1	Puzzleman	Adj	12-0	78	7-58
1	DAWGTURDS	Adj	12-0	78	0-0
1	Rudy Damone	Adj	12-0	78	0-0

Our overall standings are pretty tight, too. Plannerdawg15, Rich Flair, and wedflatrock are all at 297 points, with a host for folks close behind.

SEASON STANDINGS through Week 4

Rank	Selection Name	W-L	Pts
1	Plannerdawg15	41-8	297
1	Richt Flair	42-7	297
1	wedflatrock	41-8	297
4	One time in band camp	40-9	295
4	polarshark	40-9	295
4	CPADawg - Backup Safety U	40-9	295
7	ChiPhiGradyDawg	41-8	293
7	papadoc19	39-10	293
9	rolson	41-8	292
9	Rumph Shaker	41-8	292

The VaTech vs. Georgia Tech game on Thursday is in this week's pool. Get your picks in.

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SEC Power Poll Ballot, Week 4

1. Alabama - I'd hate to be Ole Miss playing The Tide after they have been yelled at for six days about their performance against Colorado State.
2. Georgia - A 20 point win might not keep the Dawg faithful happy, but if you were paying any attention, the defense got a lot better this week.
3. LSU - No Nick Marshalls were intercepted in writing this post.
4. Texas A&M - The Aggies better figure out their kicking thing before it ends up costing them a game.
5. South Carolina - The off week has been spent in normal ways around Columbia. Spurrier got his grand kid kicked off doing the school announcements because 'he was mispronouncing cock.'
6. Ole Miss - The Rebels just scored on Texas.
7. Florida - Tough break losing Drikel, but honestly, does he need two tibulas?
8. Vandy - Hey, New Vandy™ shouldn't struggle with UMass.
9. Missouri - Big day for the B1.5G. Indiana didn't Indiana until fairly late in the game.
10. Auburn - Honestly can't figure out if their passing game is bad because of their line play or their....HEY, Marshall just threw another INT.
11. Mississippi State - Oh, schedule Troy first.
12. Arkansas - Karma is a Scarlet Knight.
13. Tennessee - In a surprise move, Butch Jones will start one of the Clausens at QB this week.
14. Ketucky - Definitely did not lose this weekend.

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SEC announces a six day window option for Georgia at Tennessee

Oct 5th TV selections, as we know them:

Network	Time	Game
SEC TV	12:21 p.m. ET	Georgia State at Alabama
CBS	3:30 p.m. ET	Arkansas at Florida / Ole Miss at Auburn / Georgia at Tennessee
ESPN	7 p.m. ET	Arkansas at Florida / Ole Miss at Auburn / Georgia at Tennessee / LSU at Mississippi State
ESPN2	7 p.m. ET	Arkansas at Florida / Ole Miss at Auburn / Georgia at Tennessee / LSU at Mississippi State
ESPNU	7 p.m. ET	Arkansas at Florida / Ole Miss at Auburn / Georgia at Tennessee / LSU at Mississippi State
FSN	7:30 p.m. ET	Kentucky at South Carolina
CSS	7:30 p.m. ET	Missouri at Vanderbilt

My guess is that if both Georgia and Tennessee win, CBS will be in Knoxville. The one thing that might change that is is Ole Miss upsets Alabama (stay with me), they could go to Auburn to anoint Ole Miss as The Next Big Thing This Week. If Arkansas beats Texas A&M, it becomes a coin toss again.

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- Tennessee Tickets

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Petrino, staying classy

Yeah. Yelling at another coach after the game isn't going to do much to help you team play better, bubba.

Now I know who Vandy should go after when Franklin goes off to help create New Michigan™

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Fox going somewhere? Ahmed Hill thinks he might.

Michael Carvell has an interesting interview with Aquinas' Ahmed Hill (same high school as UGA TB Brendan Douglas). Hill is the second rated hoops prospect in Georgia, behind Missouri commit JaKeenan Gant, and is a shooting guard who reminds me a lot of KCP.

The entire piece is pretty interesting if you are into basketball recruiting, but he has some very interesting comments about Mark Fox around the 1:30 mark. Georgia isn't on his short list (Marquette, Missouri, Indiana, Florida, and Florida State), but if Hill is hearing rumors about Fox's tenure at Georgia, because you have to think didn't hear them from Georgia's coaches, I wonder who thinks they know something we don't.

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3 Questions Answered: North Texas

Obviously, the game went far differently than I thought it would, yet it ended up right where I thought it would. Weird.

1. How many carries will Gurley get? He had 21. I'd have taken the under if that was the number pre game.
2. How many throws will Mason get? None, but he sure looked good handing the ball to JJ Green.
3. Can this be a get right game for the defense? Oh, yes. We looked better in pass coverage. We looked much better in run support. We are still taking lazy angles on some open field tackles, but we got some kinks worked out.

Like I said, weird game. 

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Georgia's record at GameDay broadcasts

We recite the record, 3-13, as if it were a canticle designed to ward off the mere thought of the evil spirits of Lee Corso anywhere in the same area code as the Dawgs on a Saturday.

3-13
3-13
3-13

Here are the full list of Georgia's appearances with ESPN GameDay broadcasting from their game location (wins in bold):

1995: Georgia at #8 Tennessee; L 30-27
1998: #5 Tennessee at Georgia; L 22-3
1999: #10 Georgia vs. #5 Florida (in Jacksonville), L 30-14
2002: #7 Georgia at #22 Alabama, W 27-25
2002: #5 Georgia vs. Florida (in Jacksonville); L 20-13
2003: #7 Georgia at #11 LSU, L 17-10
2003: #3 LSU vs #5 Georgia (SEC Championship in Atlanta), L 34-13
2004: #4 Georgia at South Carolina, W 20-16
2004: #5 Georgia at #3 Auburn, L 24-6
2005: #4 Georgia vs. #16 Florida (in Jacksonville), L 14-10
2007: #22 Georgia at #16 Alabama, W 26-23
2008: #8 Alabama at #3 Georgia, L 41-30
2011: #1 LSU vs. #15 Georgia (SEC Championship in Atlanta), L 42-10
2012: #5 Georgia vs. #6 South Carolina, L 35-7
2012: #2 Alabama vs. #3 Georgia (SEC Championship in Atlanta); L 32-28
2013: #5 Georgia at #8 Clemson; L 38-35

Georgia is 0-2 in Athens, 0-6 in neutral sites, and 3-5 in true road games.

So, yeah. We haven't had a great record when we play a game that GameDay is featuring. Looking at Georgia's games, we were a clear dog in 3 of them (both UT games and SECCG in '11). Looking at the wins, we won 2 of the three we were clear favorites in (2002 Alabama, 2005 South Carolina). Look at the games from a final record perspective:

1995: Georgia finished 6-6, UT finished 11-1
1998: Georgia finished 9-3, UT finished 13-0*
1999: Georgia finished 8-4, UF finished 9-4
2002: Georgia finished 13-1, Alabama finished 10-3
2002: Georgia finished 13-1, Florida finished 8-5
2003: Georgia finished 10-3, LSU finished 13-1* (Reg. season and SECCG)
2004: Georgia finished 10-2, South Carolina finished 6-5
2004: Georgia finished 10-2, Auburn finished 13-0
2005: Georgia finished 10-3, Florida finished 9-3
2007: Georgia finished 11-2, Alabama finished 7-6 
2008: Georgia finished 10-3, Alabama finished 12-2
2011: Georgia finished 10-4, LSU finished 13-1
2012: Georgia finished 12-2, South Carolina finished 11-2
2012: Georgia finished 12-2, Alabama finished 13-1*
2013: Georgia currently 1-1, Clemson currently 2-0

By my count, Georgia only has one "bad" loss, the 2002 bed wetting against the worst Florida team in nearly 15 years. We lost to three eventual national champs. Seven of the 13 losses are to one or zero loss teams (counting Clemson right now). The hard part is winning the games that are pushes. Think 2005 Florida or this year's Clemson game.

Let me ask you a question. How ridiculous would it to hear Alabama coming into the 2008 season bitching about being on GameDay. They were 3-17 through 2007. Since then, they have gone 14-3. So, did GameDay change their formula in 2008 to give the Tide a chance to win the GameDay games they've played in since then?

If you think GameDay has something to do with us winning or losing a game, are you willing to say that Georgia would have won those games but for GameDay?

It is correlated. It is not causal. There is no way it can be.

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GameDay loves the SEC, but do they love UGA?

This past week, I'd done some research on teams with more than 10 appearances in GameDay featured games. While I clearly thought they wouldn't come to Athens for the LSU game, I thought it would come in handy for down the road for when we played in the GameDay feature game again. Despite what you think about our record, we want to be in GameDay featured games.

Since 1993, when GameDay premiered with #1 FSU at #2 Notre Dame in 1993, they have been to 205 locations for games. That means there have been 410 teams featured. With the rise of the SEC, it should come as no surprise that the SEC is very well represented. Six SEC teams are among the seventeen teams that have more than ten GameDay appearances.

Teams with more than 10 appearances
Florida: 24-12, 7-5 at home
Ohio State: 20-9, 10-3 at home
Oklahoma: 19-9, 5-2
Alabama: 17-20, 2-5 at home (14-3 since 2008)
Southern Cal: 15-6, 6-3 at home
LSU: 15-8, 5-4 at home
Michigan: 13-9, 8-3 at home
FSU: 11-15, 4-4 at home
Oregon: 10-6, 5-2 at home
Notre Dame: 8-11, 3-4 at home
Miami 10-7, 5-1 at home
Nebraska 9-5, 5-1
Georgia 3-13, 0-2 at home
Auburn: 7-8, 4-3 at home
Texas: 6-5, 5-1 at home
Tennessee: 6-7, 2-5 at home
Virginia Tech: 4-8, 4-1 at home

GameDay is a barometer of your program's relative strength. Westerdawg noted in the comments (and some time ago in a post), we haven't had that many games in Athens to warrant them coming to town. This week is very much that kind of match up.

Hell, they've been to Columbia, South Carolina six times. That alone doesn't convince you that we should want GameDay in Athens, I don't know what will, because Athens is a damn sight better scene than the back lot of Mad Max is. I'll get to the 'GameDay jinx' or whatever later this week, but just wanted to be sure we objectively understand the importance to recruiting and as a program PR vehicle hosting GameDay is.

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Sunday Morning Comes: North Texas

Let's start with the good stuff. The offense looked really good, especially considering we decided to let North Texas force us into a different game plan than we'd like to run. While I'm unhappy with us not lining up and running at them anyway, you need to give Bobo credit for saying, ok, we can win this way just fine. If I had one real complaint, I'd say we should have converted more 3rd downs (6/13 for the game), but with nearly 650 yards of total offense, that's probably nit picking.

Defensively, I couldn't ask for anything more. They only rushed for 7 yards on 25 carries. That from a team that came in averaging over 4ypc. We kept them to under 250 yards total offense. They only had one drive of any substance, scoring a TD. We had two sacks, both from Floyd coming off the edge.

So that leaves special teams.

1. Snapping has been an issue. I didn't notice it, but Nathan Theus got fired and walk-on Trent Frix (sounds familiar) came in. Hopefully, that'll help.
2. Our kickoffs should never, ever, ever be anything but 8+ yards deep in the end zone. I can think of no reason to ever kick a ball short of the goal line. Those five yards you probably gain by sending the team down to make a tackle just isn't worth giving up a free touchdown every third game.
3. The offensive line did ok with their pass blocking. Aaron didn't seem like he got into too many pressure situations, and when he did he was able to run for positive yardage. He looked tentative to start the second half, but quickly caught up. 
4. Someone is going to have to explain the timeout thing at the end of the first half. While trying to give Marshall a kick makes sense, what doesn't is calling the timeout on 4th, then punting it if you wanted to get Marshall the kick.  
5. Wilson looked much better in pass protect. We still have a way to go with pass protection, but I saw far fewer issues with handoff between the LBs and the DBs. It is clear Matthews is still growing into the pass coverage part of his job, his INT was a great example of anticipation an following the play. North Texas' QB mad a bad pass, but Matthews was already moving to position to make a play on the ball before it was even thrown.

I get the urge to panic because it was tied in the 3rd Q, but this was a tail whipping. The tied thing is an interesting talking point, but it is irrelevant. And yes, I know you can't just wish away the special teams things, but we just absolutely owned them defensively and with the exception of a terrible decision by Murray and a couple of weird running plays that made no sense to me, the offense was strong. Friday I was thinking a 21 or so point one win and this game is exactly what I was thinking when I wrote that, although I thought we'd see more separation early.

That is probably the bigger issue from the game being tied in the 3rd: the coaches didn't get as many reps in for young guys as I thought (or they probably hoped).

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LSU Tickets: Plenty of inventory

For a game that will likely have in the neighborhood of 150,000 people trying to get into the stadium, there are still a lot of tickets left. Lots of parking, too.

Check out the inventory.

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GameDay will be in Athens for LSU game

Well, this was clearly wrong.

From GameDay producer Lee Fitting:

Next Saturday @CollegeGameDay will be in Athens for the Dawgs and Tigers.
— Lee Fitting (@leefitting) September 22, 2013

From the official twitter feed:

It’s official. GameDay is headed between the hedges for #LSUvsUGA! #GetUp4GameDay pic.twitter.com/FJKlVAtaYS
— College GameDay (@CollegeGameDay) September 22, 2013

No idea where they'll set up, but apparently Meyers Quad was a great place for them last time.
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Dear Students

As a group, you have lost all moral high ground to complain about student ticketing procedures. I don't have an answer to your 'who gets the tickets' problem, but I know when the student section is 70% full, at best, the problem is less about fairness in distribution and more about finding who wants to be there. And shut up about it being North Texas or the rain.

Or go to Tech, where students do really support their team with attendance at games.

Signed,
A frustrated, wet alum who stayed at the game with his eight year old until Pwnn Wagers told us the game was over

PS. To give credit where it is due, there were more students at the game, as a percentage, than other fans by the end of the game. Also, the student section leads the fans in noise making. We alumni have some work to do in that regard.

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Told y'all Hutson would make it better

Probably seen on the Dawg Vent at approximately 30 seconds after Mason hands the ball off to JJ Green twice for a two play touchdown drive to make it 45-21.
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UGA Athletics generates nearly $100M in revenue

Good news, right?

There was just over $2.2M surplus to bring the accumulated reserve up to $73.9M. Football brought in over $62M in revenue, with nearly equal amounts of direct football revenue, ticket contributions, and TV revenue from the SEC and NCAA. Long term construction debt fell $9M.

It also looks like the Foley project will reach the $5M needed to get Athletics off their $7M needed to complete the Foley face lift by February. The number is $2M higher than it was at project unveiling.  It'd be interesting to see where the rest of the $35M in revenue came from.

So, we'll see how that money gets spent. Or if it actually does. Because Tennessee.

Oh, I'll also have more about this later, but I'm guessing there is some room for revenue growth in other sports with improved results, because you can bet some of that ticket and ticket contribution revenue will fall with the coming tasty cupcake parade we are likely to see in football and basketball (and baseball, for that matter).

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See Also:
- What does Bret Bielma's contract tell us about Butts-Mehre? (Blutarsky)

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3 Questions: North Texas

1. How many carries will Gurley get? We know he can run. For that matter, we know Marshall can run. With any luck we'll see plenty of touches for Douglas, Green, and Harton.
2. How many throws will Mason get? With the forecast, it'll be interesting to see what the offensive approach is. North Texas isn't a team to be taken lightly, but we should be able to out talent them. I'm not sure what that means for the defense(see Question 3), but for the offense, we need to be dynamic some to keep their defense off balance. Don't expect to see Mason until we have a 4 TD lead or the 4th quarter, whichever comes first. He'll definitely throw in his first two snaps, but if we have a big lead, he won't get too many more shots.
3. Can this be a get right game for the defense? The coaches spent some time this week talking and looking at combinations of players at Mike and the safeties/CBs. While Wilson has been very strong on the run, he's looked out of place in pass coverage. Some of that necessarily is at the feet of the guys behind him (think communication, picking up guys on the release, and calling coverage). Some of that has to be blown coverage by Wilson. Wilson has clearly been our best run stop option in the middle, so don't expect him to get the hook. Look for Grantham to find ways to get all of those guys standing up on defense to work better together, even if that means different personnel groupings.

This projects, even with the rain, to be a 5 TD win. For me, I think it is more like a 21 point blowout, especially considering the rain. 

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Rain in the forecast for North Texas

It remains to be seen if it will be Arizona State level rain, but be forewarned:

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LSU Ticket rices teady; Parking prices have fallen

Not much movement on ticket prices, although parking prices have fallen a bit. Unless Auburn beats this them this weekend, I don't expect prices to fall too much.
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What I'm looking for this weekend

While I'm at North Texas tomorrow, there are some games that offer compelling looks at future opponents and SEC teams:

• Missouri at Indiana, 8pm on BTN. Ok, Missouri has put up some yardage (currently 3rd in the conference behind TAMU and UGA). However, their competition has been less solid. They put up 694 on some dark blue and mostly yellow team, but only put up 384 on a darker blue and more yellow team. Neither of those teams were named Michigan. Will they break 350 against a suspect Indiana squad? To give you sense of what I think, the darker blue and more yellow team gave up 415 to Florida the week before they played Missouri.
• Auburn at LSU, 7:30pm on ESPN. How many points will LSU score? Will Auburn get a first down? Can Mettenberger walk on water? Heady stuff here.
• Colorado State at Alabama, 7pm on ESPN2. Sacrificial rams, if you ask me.
• Tennessee at Florida, 3:30 on CBS. After going to Eugene and having to face Oregon, they go to Gainesville and face the anti-Oregon. Except this team has a very good defense. Take the under, unless it is zero.
• Vandy at UMass, 12pm on ESPNews. Dammit Vandy, if you are going to play big boy SEC football, you have to schedule like big boy SEC football programs. We don't play MAC teams on the road, even if it gets you in the Patriot's stadium. Have some damn pride.
• Troy at Mississippi State, 7:30pm on FSN. Last shot for the Bizzaro Dawgs to get a win over a school from Alabama.
• North Carolina at Georgia Tech, 12pm on ESPN. There is no reason to think North Carolina's porous defense can stop The Wizard of North Avenue's running game, but it'd be cool if they did.
• SMU at Texas A&M. 7pm on ESPNU. Is there such a thing as a let down game if you lost your biggest game of the season?

No wonder GameDay decided to go to North Dakota.
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Bovada Heisman and National Champion odds

Three weeks in is still kind of early for thinking about Heisman odds, but it is interesting to me that Oregon's Marcus Mariota, on the back of beating a very suspect Tennessee defense for a brazillian yards, is in front of Manziel and McCarron. Taking nothing away from Mariota, who is The Real Deal, despite both A&M and Alabama's defensive issues, both are a long way from Dooley's Lazy Hounds Who Don't Even Chase Cats:

Also, Murray is above Gurley, which is all about national media reporting the monkey being off Murray's back.

Odds to win the 2013-2014 Heisman Trophy

Marcus Mariota (QB Oregon)                              9/2 

Johnny Manziel (QB Texas A&M)                        5/1 

A.J. McCarron (QB Alabama)                             13/2

Teddy Bridgewater (QB Louisville)                      13/2 

Jameis Winston (QB Florida State)                     9/1 

Tajh Boyd (QB Clemson)                                   10/1 

Braxton Miller (QB Ohio State)                           12/1 

De'Anthony Thomas (RB Oregon)                       141 

T.J. Yeldon (RB Alabama)                                  16/1 

Aaron Murray (QB Georgia)                                18/1 

Brett Hundley (QB UCLA)                                   18/1 

Todd Gurley (RB Georgia)                                  20/1

As for winning the national championship goes, Alabama and Oregon are still your top two. Texas A&M falls down to 100/1, with the likes of Georgia Tech, Northwestern, and Florida. Georgia checks in at 22/1.

Odds to win the 2013-2014 BCS National Championship

Alabama                       2/1 

Oregon                         4/1 

Ohio State                    13/2 

Clemson                       12/1  

Florida State                 12/1 

LSU                              14/1 

Stanford                       14/1 

Michigan                       16/1 

Oklahoma State            16/1 

Miami                           20/1 

Georgia                        22/1 

Louisville                      25/1 

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Tim Worley named SEC Legend

Congrats to a Damn Good Dawg.
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A few nuggets from Bruce Feldman's time with Texas A&M

While I don't think there is anything particularly earth shattering about his article, there were a few nuggets I found very interesting.

• Youth on defense. We've spent a lot of time hand wringing over Georgia's young defense, but one thing that kept coming back to me during the Alabama-TAMU game was how both defenses looked out of sorts. Admittedly, it is due to laziness, but I had no idea the Aggies' defense has more freshmen on their two deep than Georgia does. Let that sink in. That is on a defense that was 9th in the conference in total D last year. That leads me to the inevitable questions: Did the media/coaches think their offense was so much better that they'd just super outscore everyone and do you think Texas A&M would beat Clemson?
• But seriously, they had way more suspensions than Georgia in their defense. Would this game be the game of the century if they'd played Clemson (or another quality opponent) in their season opener?
• They looked at the Georgia loss to Clemson to get the Aggies to focus on the 'what if' question. I could make the argument that not playing in your conference championship game changes the math, but someone, somewhere would just tell me how much I hate America for not wanting an Alabama-Texas A&M rematch.
• Texas A&M's offense is all about balance. Mike Bobo nods approvingly. 
• Rick Ross at practice. Rick. Ross.
• It might be for show (or this particular article), but the 'Sumlin hates Manziel' narrative gets killed pretty good.
• Sumlin is a good coach. He is a far better leader.

Oh, and Sumlin is completely the anti-Saban, at least as far as approach goes. Can you imagine Saban allowing a reporter not named Finebaum sitting in His Staff Meetings?

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