College Football Wrap-Up: Week 11

After a very sluggish start in the first half, the Dawgs pulled away from Appalachian State and won 45-6 on Saturday. There's really not a lot of takeaways when you defeat a 2-8 team, but here's what I observed:

Photo Credit: Athens-Banner Herald

• Aaron Murray now owns the SEC Career Passing TDs record, previously held by Florida's Danny Wuerrfel. Murray has 115 passing TDs, which puts him into the Top 10 all-time NCAA record book.  He is within striking distance of the 5th all-time leader touchdown passer, Landry Jones of Oklahoma, who finished his career with 123 TDs. Murray has had a remarkable career at Georgia and will leave with the SEC Career records for Passing Yards, Touchdown Passes, and Total Offense.  Let that sink in for just a moment.
• It was nice to see Hutson Mason finally get a chance to play this season.  He went 11-14 for 160 yards, 1 TD, and 1 interception.  He is going to have so many weapons around him next season.  Hopefully, his 5th season will look more like the one DJ Shockley enjoyed instead of the one Joe Cox had in 2009.
• The only thing worse than running a fake punt versus App State is running one unsuccessfully.  What was that all about?
• Jonathan Rumph made a nice debut on Saturday.  I know he actually played a few snaps last week against Florida, but it was nice to see him make catches on Saturday. He actually finished the game 2nd in receiving yards.  If not for a hamstring injury that he suffered in the preseason, he really could have made a big impact on this team with all the injuries at WR.
• Along those same lines, think about our WR corp next season: Malcolm Mitchell, Michael Bennett, Chris Conley, Reggie Davis, Justin Scott-Wesley, and Jonathan Rumph, along with promising young scholarship players like Tramel Terry, Blake Tibbs, and Uriah Lemay.  The first six I listed could be starters or major contributors at any school in the country.
• Ray Drew has developed into a very fine defensive lineman.  He leads the team with 6 sacks on the season. In case you're wondering, that's four more than Mr. Clowney.

The Worst New Penalty in College Football: Targeting

In case you missed it, Georgia's Corey Moore, starting safety, was flagged for the penalty and ejected from the game in the 2nd quarter.  Moore clearly led with his shoulder on the play. Instead of rehashing my thoughts on this new rule, I thought I would share the opinions of a few others:

Corey Moore was ejected for playing football. He walked off the field to a standing ovation. pic.twitter.com/yPQRTj73wn
— Radi Nabulsi (@RadiNabulsi) November 9, 2013

Thomas Davis&Greg Blue would've been ejected from every single game they played @ Georgia if this targeting crap existed then! #letThemPlay
— Alex Wood (@Awood45) November 9, 2013

And finally, after seeing all the poor calls against Georgia with this new targeting rule, someone please explain to me why targeting was not called on this play in the LSU/Alabama game.

And the Ducks drop out of the Race!
Who else enjoyed seeing Oregon get handled by Stanford on Thursday night?  I enjoyed it so much so that I stayed up past midnight to watch the celebration in Palo Alto after the game.
Once again Oregon plays a team that's physical along the line of scrimmage; once again, Oregon loses.  I've seen this before: Stanford in 2012, LSU in 2011, and Auburn in the 2011 BCS Championship game.

The Race to the BCS National Championship Game
It's pretty clear to me that Alabama and FSU are the two best teams in the country and I believe it would be a great match-up.  As a matter of fact, if they played during the regular season I'm convinced that Florida State would defeat Alabama.  However, if you give Saban 4 weeks to prepare, then Bama will have a plan ready to defend Jameis Winston and company.  

The other contenders that are still left are Stanford, Ohio State, and Baylor.  In my opinion, both Baylor and Stanford are more deserving than Ohio State to play in the championship, if Alabama or FSU stumble.  However, the national media (i.e. ESPN) has a love affair with Urban Meyer and the Buckeyes and I'm not sure either team could overcome that to move ahead of Ohio State.

Ohio State's most impressive win thus far is against a 7-2 Wisconsin team. The cumulative record of their final 3 opponents is 13-14 with only one of those teams having a winning record (Michigan). Have you seen the Wolverines play this season?  The Buckeyes have a ridiculously easy schedule.  Finally, there's this:

Ohio State has not played a regular season top ten opponent since 9/12/2009. Simply amazing.
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravisBGID) November 4, 2013

Meanwhile, Georgia is going to face their 4th Top 10 opponent this season when they play Auburn on Saturday.

Florida will be Home for the Holidays
Vanderbilt built a 24-3 lead versus Florida on Saturday and held on to win 34-17.  It was Vanderbilt's first win in Gainesville since 1945 and the loss drops the Gators to 4-5. With games remaining at South Carolina, Georgia Southern, and Florida State, the Gators are likely to finish 5-7 and miss a bowl game altogether.  If they do finish 5-7, it will be their first losing season since 1979.  I've contended all season that Muschamp would have to replace his offensive coordinator, Brent Pease, in the offseason.  Many folks still believe that athletic director Jeremy Foley is a big fan of Will Muschamp and will give him a 4th season in Gainesville to make amends with the Gator Nation.  In my opinion though, if South Carolina and FSU both beat Florida handily, I wouldn't be surprised to see Foley make a change.  Particularly, if he is confident that he can make a splash hire with someone like Art Briles.

Odds & Ends

• Alabama defeated LSU for the third consecutive time on Saturday night.  It was worth watching, if for no other reason than to see Saban jump into McCarron's arms after the game (seriously).  The Tigers committed two costly turnovers in the first half. Otherwise, I believe LSU would have lead 21-14 at the half.  In the 2nd half, Alabama manhandled LSU along the lines of scrimmage and pulled away in convincing fashion.  I felt like the fake punt by Alabama in the 3rd quarter was the turning point of the game.
• Don't look now, but Vanderbilt is 14-6 in their last 20 games.  Not to mention, they have defeated Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida in the last 3 games against those opponents. Albeit with a little help from the officials to secure the win versus Georgia.
• Speaking of Vanderbilt, Tennessee must defeat both Vanderbilt and Kentucky to become bowl eligible. Fortunately, the Vols have an off week before hosting the Commodores on November 23rd.  Butch Jones has faced a very difficult schedule this season and, while he secured his signature win versus South Carolina, he would definitely love to finish the season in a bowl game to continue building momentum. Vanderbilt, meanwhile, can become bowl eligible with a victory at home on Saturday versus Kentucky.
• Here are the latest bowl projections from ESPN and CBS Sports.  It's really too early to determine how the bowl games will shake out, but it is interesting to see what others foresee with the end of the regular season just 3 weeks away.  Personally, I wouldn't be very excited with any of the match-ups that are projected for Georgia versus Iowa, Virginia Tech, or Miami.  However, I would be very intrigued by a Oregon versus Clemson match-up in the Orange Bowl.
• Each week, Auburn and Missouri look more and more like contenders in the SEC.  I will have more on the upcoming Georgia/Auburn match-up later this week.