I normally pull for the underdog in most athletic contests, unless I have a real rooting interest in a particular team.  When an SEC squad plays in a BCS Championship Game, that constitutes a real rooting interest.  So I would have been pulling for Alabama to beat Notre Dame a week from Monday in Miami anyway.

But now I want the Tide to kick the hell out of the Irish.

As we told you a few weeks back, several Notre Dame fans were buying up and tweeting about T-shirts bearing the message: Catholics vs. Cousins…

Ah, a nice jab at the stereotype of inbred Southerners.

Well now Irish fans are buying up another offensive shirt that also makes fun of Alabamans and Southerners:

Nice, huh?

As we suggested last time around, maybe it’s time for folks in the Yellowhammer State to start printing “Pachyderms vs. Pedophiles” shirts to see if any Notre Dame fans take offense.

Just a shirt?  Sure.  A shirt — a second shirt — that insults millions of Americans who happen to live in the South.  And this one has the added gall to insult millions of Americans across the country who can’t afford nicer homes.  Classy.

So congrats, Notre Dame fans.  I’d taken up for you earlier this year when ESPN’s Rick Reilly decided to rip your football program.  Now you’ve turned the one man south of the Mason-Dixon line who respects your history and tradition against you.  Very much against you.

Anyone know where a man can buy a Houndstooth hat?

There were a number of questionable calls (that went against both teams) during Saturday’s night’s SEC Championship Game.  A tipped pass here, a roughing the passer there.  But one call is still stirring emotions on Tuesday morning… and still causing a number of fans to email a specific YouTube clip to the MrSEC inbox.

In Alabama’s 32-28 win over Georgia, Tide defensive lineman Quinton Dial delivered what was clearly a blow to the head of Bulldog quarterback Aaron Murray.  But Murray wasn’t in the pocket as a passer.  He was just another guy on the field after tossing an interception.  Let’s just say Murray didn’t keep his head on a swivel:

As you can see, there was clearly helmet-to-helmet contact on the play and SEC coordinator of officials Steve Shaw admitted yesterday that a flag should have been thrown (assuming an official saw the hit).  “We missed the call,” Shaw said.

According to Dial’s teammate Robert Lester, the senior lineman has been getting “a lot of heat from outside sources.”  Lester commented that the hit was just a part of football and you can bet Mike Slive won’t be thrilled to read the comments that follow after he’s suspended several players over the course of the last two years for illegal helmet-to-helmet or above-the-shoulder hits to defenseless players:

“I feel like it’s all a part of football.  Players take shots at us, we take shots at players.  It’s all football.  It’s a physical sport.  If you can got on the field and not get hit, more power to you.  That’s what football is about, hitting somebody, especially if you play defense.”

True enough.  But hitting someone legally is a requirement of the NCAA rule book and the SEC’s commissioner has been enforcing that call in especially egregious cases.

So, will Slive suspend Dial for Alabama’s next game — the BCS Championship Game with Notre Dame?  Shaw didn’t rule it out yesterday:

“As you’ve noticed, Commissioner has been vigilant on this and he did it when warranted and didn’t when it wasn’t.  I’m not sure the upcoming opponent is ever a condition in the decision.  I think it’s more based on the facts in the play…

By rule, you can’t hit a defenseless player above the shoulders.  What the determination needs to be is was this a defenseless player and was contact initiated above the shoulders?  When we go through video review of it, that’s what we’ll have to determine.  And then… as you break it down, did he lead with the head or lead with the shoulder?  From game action, it was a personal foul regardless of how we break it down frame by frame.”

Only, it wasn’t called as a personal foul on the field.

As for whether or not the hit will result in suspension, there’s little question that contact initiated above the shoulders.  Dial also clearly led with his head and not his shoulder.

But was Murray defenseless?  When Slive has suspended players in the past, it has been for hits against receivers and punt returners who were trying to catch passes.  Murray clearly had his eyes on the interception return, but is that a question of a player being defenseless or just unaware of his surroundings?

That could be a point the league office debates while determining its action.  If Murray’s “job” on the play was to catch a football and he got popped, it’s likely Dial would be suspended.  But Murray was simply not paying attention and the league may rule that while he didn’t see the hit coming, he was not literally “defenseless.”

That’s not our view, mind you.  We at MrSEC.com believe it was an unnecessary shot at an opposing quarterback — a protected species — and that Slive should hand Dial a one-game suspension.

The trouble is, Slive might not want to sit someone for a national title bout.  That’s a rare opportunity for a player (if you don’t play at Alabama).

Georgia AD Greg McGarity said he also missed the play during live action and that he was “stunned” when he viewed the hit on the internet.  “It is definitely a play we will submit for review, but I’m sure that’s already being done,” he said.  “I’m anxious to see what (Slive) says about it…. This is a case where it could have had serious implications on Aaron, not only in that game but in future games.”

You ca bet a lot of people in Tuscaloosa and South Bend are anxious to hear the commissioner’s ruling as well.

Dial has played in 12 of the Tide’s 13 games this season.  He’s recorded 21 total tackles, 4.5 tackles-for-loss, and 1.5 sacks.  He also has four quarterback hurries.

Instant, mass communication has changed everything.  Absolutely everything.  Our world is now filled with people who have shorter attention spans, less patience, and an overall greater sense of entitlement.  We are so focused on our own immediate gratification that anything requiring more than one or two clicks on a laptop or smartphone is just too darn much work.

That kind of thinking makes every decision appear to be bigger than it actually is.  There is no tomorrow, only now.  Right now.  As in this very frickin’ instant now.

Which is probably why I continue to read stories stating that:

*  Arkansas has to hire the right coach now or else the Razorbacks will spend eternity as second-class SEC citizens.

*  Kentucky has to hire the right coach now or else its football program is doomed forever.

*  Tennessee has to hire the right coach now or else it will be stumble through irrelevance for decades.

*  Auburn must fire Gene Chizik and hire the right coach now or else the football program may never recover.

Bull.

Bull on all four.  It may feel that way to a fan.  It may make for a nice column for a writer.  But it’s bull.

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The SEC got good news when the latest BCS standings were released yesterday evening.  Alabama’s loss to Texas A&M on Saturday didn’t sink the Crimson Tide’ title hopes as much it might have.

For league fans who’ve grown accustomed to chanting S-E-C, S-E-C, S-E-C after every BCS title game, Bama is the conference’s best hope for reaching said game.  As we showed you two weeks ago, rarely do teams climb from outside the top four spaces into the top two (and the championship game) over the final month of the season.

So when Alabama dropped to fourth — and no further — it was actually a good thing for Mike Slive’s league.  On two fronts, really, but we’ll get to that in a second.

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This weekend’s big Alabama-Texas A&M clash in Tuscaloosa will grab the interest of a whole lotta Southeastern Conference football fans.  And not just for the obvious “it’s a big game” reason.

Think about it.

For those SEC fans who want the league to capture yet another BCS championship — the conference’s seventh in a row — Alabama is by far the best bet to capture said title.  No other SEC team has anything other than a very long shot chance of even reaching the championship game.  If you want the league to remain on top, you almost have to be cheering for the Crimson Tide at this point.

But to quote Randy Travis — who must be a heckuva guy to party with — “on the other hand,” another Alabama championship would just aid Nick Saban in his “process” of building the Tide into an unstoppable juggernaut of John Calipari/Kentucky basketball proportions.  SEC rivals might like title #7 for the sake of rubbing everyone else’s nose in it, but can they possibly root for Bama to pull further away from their own schools?  After all, that’ll just leave Tide fans to rub every other SEC fan’s nose in it.

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Alabama 21 – LSU 17

1. Down 17-14, Alabam stuns LSU in Death Valley.

2. Pat Forde: “Let the record show that the historic play was AJ to T.J. for the TD.”

3. Seventy-two yards, five plays, 43 seconds.  The drive that saved the Tide’s season.

4. Kevin Scarbinsky on AJ McCarron: “On that drive, the Alabama quarterback wasn’t a game manager. He was a game-changer.”

5. Alabama center Barrett Jones: “We were talking about what we wanted to run, me and Coach Stout. I said screens have been there all night.”

6. AJ McCarron’s dad to his son before the game: “”There’s 100,000 people there to party,” Tony McCarron said. “Piss ‘em off.” 

7. Les Miles: “I wish I had a couple of my calls back, just so you know.”

8. Only second home loss at night for Tigers under Miles.  ”There are some sick guys back there.”

9. LSU dominated everywhere but scoreboard – 435 to 331 total yards, nearly a 20-minute advantage in time-of-possession.

10. Bobby Hebert tossed from press box.

Once every few years a team will play in weather so bad that lightning could lead to a delay in game action.  It doesn’t happen often — I myself have only attended one lightning-delayed game in a lifetime of going to games from Auburn to Wisconsin.

But when lightning strikes at Alabama, the Crimson Tide know what to do.

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Tennesssee expects to sell 85,000 tickets for Troy game Saturday
Tennessee coach Derek Dooley has suspended DL Omari Phillips due to an unspecified rule violation
Auburn coaches won’t comment on allegations that program is under NCAA investigation and that two coaches have been pulled from the road recruiting
Kentucky athletic director Mitch Barnhart says football program is “not where we want it to be just yet”
Georgia’s Mark Richt says LB Jarvis Jones is “the best” player “in the whole United States of America”
South Carolina DL Jadeveon Clowney has played three straight games with a deeply bruised foot
Tennessee RB Rajion Neal may return to action against Troy this weekend as his ankle is getting better
Prepping for this weekend’s game with Alabama, LSU S Eric Reid says the Tigers “still have scars” from January’s BCS title game loss to the Tide
Keep up with SEC news every single day at MrSEC.com and twitter.com/mrsec

It wasn’t so long ago that Alabama-LSU was just another good SEC rivalry.  It had had its moments, yes, but it wasn’t the game in the league.  But then Nick Saban happened… at both schools.  LSU rose under Saban in the early 2000s and Les Miles has kept the Tiger train a rollin’ right along since taking over in 2005.  Alabama returned to the pinnacle of college football soon after Saban landed in Tuscaloosa.

Now what was once a good SEC game is the top annual fistfight in college football.  And a fistfight it is.  Take it from Alabama center Barrett Jones:

“It’ll definitely be the most physical game we play all year, without a doubt.  The most physical games I’ve played in my life have been against them.

We really respect the way they play football.  They’re not really going to try to trick us.  They’re going to line up and play their defense and we’re going to line up and play our offense.  That’s why we like playing them and that’s why they like playing us.  We both respect each other and both really are kind of founded on toughness.”

What’s truly amazing is just how closely Alabama and LSU stack up statistically.

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QB Jonathan Wallace will become Auburn’s third starting quarterback of the season against New Mexico State
Tennessee’s Derek Dooley has suspended DL Omari Phillips due to an unspecified rule violation
Auburn’s Gene Chizik refused to address claims that the NCAA is once again investigating his program
Georgia’s Mark Richt says LB Jarvis Jones is “the best” player “in the whole United States of America”
South Carolina DL Jadeveon Clowney has played three straight games with a deeply bruised foot
Tennessee RB Rajion Neal may return to action against Troy this weekend as his ankle is getting better
Alabama’s Nick Saban turns 61 today
Prepping for this weekend’s game with Alabama, LSU S Eric Reid says the Tigers “still have scars” from January’s BCS title game loss to the Tide
Keep up with SEC news every single day at MrSEC.com and twitter.com/mrsec