Florida is up to #4 in the nation in the latest AP basketball poll
Ole Miss is ranked #16 and Missouri #17 in the latest AP basketball poll
Only three SEC teams (Florida, Ole Miss and Missouri) are among the RPI top 50
With Big XII athletic directors meeting this week, rumors of conference expansion are swirling again
Kentucky and North Carolina have agreed to renew their hoops rivalry next year in Chapel Hill
According to The Sports Business Daily, Tennessee’s athletic department is $200 million in debt
Super Bowl linebacker and ex-Ole Miss Rebel Patrick Willis says he’s still motivated by Tennessee’s decision not to recruit him
Follow the SEC all year long on MrSEC.com

When you talk about The Greatest anything in sports, you’re setting yourself up for trouble.  Everyone has an opinion on who or what The Greatest is.  That’s because everyone uses different criteria to determine what The Greatest even means.

Example: Who’s the NFL’s best quarterback?  The guy with the most Super Bowl trophies?  The guy with the most MVP awards?  The guy with the most passing yards on the back of his trading card?

As for college football, we can use the Heisman Trophy as another example.  Some people believe “most outstanding player” means the best offensive player on the best team.  Some people believe it means the most valuable player on a team, regardless of highlights and hype.  Still others cast their votes based on hard and fast stats.

So when we ask who should go on an imaginary Mt. Rushmore of SEC football coaches, we know we’re opening the door and inviting debate to come on in and sit a spell.

Fair enough.

As usual, we wanted to inject a little data, a bit of math into our study of the SEC’s greatest all-time coaches.  We also wanted to weed the competition for those four slots — we said Mt. Rushmore after all — down to a manageable number.

Our first step was to figure out who should be left out.  We set our start date at 1935.  The SEC was founded in 1932 and ’35 made for a nice round number.  If a man didn’t coach the majority of his career after that year he was excluded from our exercise.  So if you’re wondering why someone like Vanderbilt’s Dan McGugin isn’t on the list, now you know.

Next, we decided to include only coaches who have toiled in the Southeastern Conference for at least a decade.  Regardless of a coach’s success, if he hasn’t spent at least 10 years in the SEC how much historical impact could he really have?  Florida’s Urban Meyer — despite two BCS titles in six years — failed to pass this portion of our test.

One-year wonders were out, too.  Only coaches with multiple SEC championships were considered deserving of placement on our monument.  That eliminated coaches like Auburn’s Shug Jordan.

We decided that a coach also had to have won at least one consensus — that’s consensus — national championship during his tenure as an SEC head coach.  That eliminated Tennessee’s Johnny Majors, for example.  Majors won a national title at Pittsburgh, but he didn’t win one in the SEC.  So he’s out.

Finally, we eliminated any coaches who had their success at a program no longer in the SEC.  There are three ex-SEC schools out there: Sewanee, Tulane, and Georgia Tech.  One of them had a coach who fit all of the above criteria.  But it felt a little silly to consider Bobby Dodd for a spot on the SEC’s Mt. Rushmore when it was Dodd who famously yanked Tech from the Southeastern Conference.  So coaches like Dodd are out.

Those criteria — post-1935 career, 10 seasons in the SEC, multiple SEC titles, one consensus national title, and employment at a current SEC institution — helped narrow our choices down to just seven men.

Read the rest of this entry »

Arkansas hires Wisconsin coach Brent Bielema its new football coach
Auburn hires Gus Malzahn as its new head coach
Tennessee expeced to name its new head coach soon
Wednesday night SEC basketball scores
Missouri 81 – Southeast Missouri State 65
Mississippi State 53 – UT San Antonio 42
Arkansas 81 – Oklahoma 78
Georgia Tech 62 – Georgia 54
Kentucky 88 – Samford 56
Follow SEC News at MrSEC.com and on Twitter at Twitter.com/mrsec

Many thanks to the Associated Press today.  Oh, sure they announced that Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel was a unanimous choice as their SEC Offensive Player of the Year.  And, yes, the redshirt freshman most certainly deserved the honor after setting a new single season total offense record in a league once rule by dual-threat dynamos Cam Newton and Tim Tebow.

But more importantly, the AP sent out a headline that’s pretty much been used by all: “‘Johnny Football’ Lauded As Mr. SEC.”

Shucks, folks, all of his here at MrSEC.com appreciate the free plug.

In all seriousness, is it any wonder Manziel won the award?  His final stat line for the season:

*  Led the SEC in rushing with 1,181 yards on 184 carries for a 6.42-yard average and 19 touchdowns

*  Third in the SEC passing with 3,419 yards on 400 attempts with a completion percentage of 68.3, 24 touchdowns, and just eight interceptions

*  Accounted for 39 rushing plays of 10 or more yards, 18 of 20 or more yards, and 10 of 30 or more yards

*  Led the SEC in total offense with 4,600 yards thru 12 games for an average per-game performance of 383.3 yards
The AP’s Offensive Player of the Year Award for the SEC isn’t the only honor Manziel is expected to win this week.  He’s also believed to be the frontrunner for the Heisman Trophy.

Texas A&M jumps to No. 9 in the AP poll, No. 10 in the Coaches poll.  Alabama drops to No. 4 in AP, No. 5 in Coaches Poll.  with the loss to LSU, Mississippi State drops out of both polls.

AP Poll: Alabama #4, Georgia #5, Florida #7, LSU #8, Texas A&M #9, South Carolina #12.

Coaches Poll: Georgia #4, Alabama #5, Florida #7, LSU #8, Texas A&M #10, South Carolina #11

Jerry Palm: SEC champ goes WHERE?

The new AP Poll is out and Alabama jumped to the top of the rankings.  The Tide’s 41-14 win over #8 Michigan — that’d now be #19 Michigan — was enough to push Bama past Southern Cal and old SEC pal Lane Kiffin.

The SEC landed five teams in the Top 10 overall and six in the Top 25.  But wait, there’s more.  An additional five league teams were among those receiving votes.  That means 11 of the SEC’s 14 teams received at least one vote in this week’s AP poll.  (Our condolences to Kentucky, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt fans.)

At any rate, here’s how the SEC fared in the AP voting after Week One:

1.  Alabama

3.  LSU

7.  Georgia

8.  Arkansas

9.  South Carolina (tied with West Virginia)

24.  Florida

Also receiving votes were Tennessee (which came in at #27), Missouri (#36), Texas A&M (#37), Mississippi State (#40), and Auburn (tied with MSU for what would be #40).

UPDATE — Nick Saban’s team has also claimed the #1 slot in this week’s USA Today Coaches Poll.

Arkansas football coach Bobby Petrino has been hospitalized following a motorcycle crash last night.  According to police this morning, Petrino’s cycle veered of a highway and no other vehicles were involved in the wreck.  A police spokesman said Petrino was taken to a hospital in Washington County last night but that he did not know the coach’s condition or whether he is still hospitalized.

Sources told ESPN.com’s Joe Schad that the coach “did not suffer life-threatening injuries and is expected to recover.”  A “source close to Petrino” told Schad that Petrino is “pretty banged up.”

Tom Murphy of The Arkansas Democrat Gazette has tweeted the following:


“Source close to situation said Bobby Petrino had multiple broken ribs, “all kinds of cuts and bruises,” neck sprain, but going to be OK.”


Petrino is “an avid motorcycle enthusiast” according to the AP report.  The crash happened about 7:45pm ET last night about 23 miles southeast of Fayetteville. 

Arkansas’ coach is expected to try to return to practice as soon as possible, but no one knows how long it will take him to recover.

Bobby Petrino is a lucky man.

When you complete just the third undefeated SEC basketball season since the 1950s, you’re going to wind up with a lot of awards and accolades.  That’s exactly what’s happening for Kentucky.  And rightfully so.

The Associated Press released its All-SEC squad yesterday and four Cats made the list:


FIRST TEAM

Anthony Davis, F, Kentucky
John Jenkins, G, Vanderbilt
Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, F, Kentucky
Arnett Moultrie, F, Mississippi State
Dee Bost, G, Mississippi State


SECOND TEAM

Kenny Boynton, G, Florida
Jeffery Taylor, G/F, Vanderbilt
Bradley Beal, G, Florida
Terrence Jones, F, Kentucky
JaMychal Green, F, Alabama
Jeronne Maymon, F, Tennessee


HONORABLE MENTION

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, G, Georgia
Murphy Holloway, F, Ole Miss
Doron Lamb, G, Kentucky
Trevor Releford, G, Alabama
Erving Walker, G, Florida
BJ Young, G, Arkansas


In addition, the AP gave it’s three SEC awards to the Wildcats as well:


Player of the Year: Anthony Davis
Newcomer of the Year: Anthony Davis
Coach of the Year: John Calipari


Last week, we at MrSEC.com handed out our own “All-Complete” team which was based on offensive and defensive production.  You can find that list here.  From a stats-based perspective, LSU’s Storm Warren and Johnny O’Bryant deserved some mention on the above lists as did Vandy’s Festus Ezeli.

Alabama’s resounding 21-0 win in the Superdome last night ended any real controversy regarding a split national title.  Of the 60 voters who make up the AP Poll, 55 of them tabbed the Crimson Tide as their #1 team.

Oklahoma State got four votes while LSU received one.  Just a guess, but here’s betting four of those voters are from the Midwest while one is from Louisiana.

At any rate, the final rankings left LSU at #2 ahead of #3 Oklahoma State and when you compare the teams’ resumes, that’s fair.  The #4 slot went to Oregon and Arkansas finished #5.

With a unanimous title this year, Alabama has now had nine national title-winning seasons according to the AP and/or Coaches Poll.

The winner of the BCS Championship Game will win the BCS championship. 

Duh.

If that’s LSU, then the Tigers will claim that prize right along with the AP national title as well.  They’ve already finished a rugged regular season with a 13-0 record, after all.

But if LSU loses to Alabama, expect many to push for the Tigers to win the AP’s crown.  After all — it will be argued — they beat Bama in Tuscaloosa during the regular season and their body of work will still be stronger than the Tide’s even with a loss in the rematch game.

Don’t believe some will angle to split the title?  Just check out the open to the Associated Press story from last night’s Fiesta Bowl:


“The BCS system left Oklahoma State bitter.

After a thrilling win in the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl, the Cowboys have a chance to throw a stick in the spokes.

Surviving a missed field goal at the end of regulations and getting a big kick of its own in overtime, No. 3 Oklahoma State opened the door for the chance at a split national championship with a wildly entertaining 41-38 win over No. 4 Stanford on Monday night.

‘We feel like we could beat anyone in the country,’ Cowboys receiver Colton Chelf said.”


Personally, we don’t think OSU has a legitimate shot at grabbing a share at the title.  If LSU loses, most voters looking to split the crown will compare the two teams’ schedules and side with the gang from the Bayou.

But if the above comments regarding the Cowboys are any indication, there will be some who’ll look to slide LSU past Alabama in the AP.  So long as the Tigers aren’t blown out of the Superdome.

Now, Bama fans will scream that that’s not fair — trust me, they have been doing just that for a month — and LSU fans will say oh-yes-it-is-100-percent fair, but both groups would take the complete opposite views if the roles were reversed.  In other words, the backers of the teams don’t matter.  Only the AP voters matter.

And the fact is… whoever wins the BCS Championship Game will be guaranteed the crystal football and nothing more.  If LSU loses in the title game, expect some voters — possibly many — to cast their votes for the Tigers in the AP balloting.  If there’s a push for Oklahoma State, you can bet there will be a bigger push for LSU.

Like it or not.

UPDATE — The Birmingham News polled 20 of the 60 AP voters and found that a majority of the 20 will vote the winner of the BCS Championship Game as the AP’s #1 team, too.  Some, however, admitted that they would consider voting for LSU even if the Tigers lose to the Tide.