Posts from the Sec Category at FanHouse - AOL Sports Blog

"Old School" is the College Football FanHouse's irregular look back at the rich history of college football, usually through the medium of embeddable flash video. Check out the Old School archive for more famous plays and infamous hair.

Old School usually consists highlight clips of relatively recent games, but thanks to the University of Georgia's media archive department the entire 1947 Sugar Bowl is now online and streaming:




That, obviously, is not the entire game. Hoo-boy, those would be some pissed of guys in hats if it was. This is the entire game. If you dig the era when "football" was defiantly pronounced as two words, coaches regarded the forrward pass as deadly poison, and guys like Georgia's Charley Trippi played quarterback, receiver, running back, punt returner, kick returner, linebacker, and punter, this is your jam, man.

Georgia would beat North Carolina 20-10, finishing a perfect 10-0 but losing out on the national title to Notre Dame. Georgia's official site takes a distinctly non-'Bama tack when discussing the potential screwjob, highlighting the team but setting Georgia's two "consensus" national champions apart.

Is this man reacting to the awl in his nose or college football's nonconference schedules? No one knows for sure.

These days in college football it's rarely a matter of who has the best nonconference slate, but rather who has the least worst. According to the Oklahoman, that title goes to the ACC and their impressive(?) 48% BCS nonconference schedule. The entire field:

• ACC: 48%
• Pac Ten: 45%
• Big East: 39%
• SEC & Big Twelve: 31%
• Big Ten: 29%

The Pac Ten finishes second but they're the only conference playing nine conference games, so they each have one more real opponent involuntarily inserted into the schedule. If you give the Pac 10 credit for that, their percentage shoots up to 58%. Similarly, the Big East should get dinged for only playing seven conference games, which would bring them down to the three conferences trailing the pack.

And last: the Big Ten, which plays about one real nonconference opponent per team and fills the schedule out with MAC snacks and the like. Making it even worse for the Big Ten are some of the "BCS" opponents they've lined up: Notre Dame (3), Syracuse (2), Iowa State, and Duke comprise more than half of their BCS opponent games. Those teams were 9-39 last year.

High school All-American offensive lineman Matt Patchan was shot at a Tampa-area park Friday night, but should be okay.

"Matt Patchan was a gunshot victim Friday night at a Tampa-area park," Meyer said in the statement. "He was a bystander and shot in the left shoulder and is expected to fully recover in three weeks."

Patchan's injuries are described as "non-lifethreatening" (obviously) and doctors chose to leave the bullet lodged in "soft tissue." As the old saying goes, bullet goes in, bullet stays in.*

The true freshman has been a standout in spring practice, even considered by some local beat writers to be among the most impressive players on the Gators' defensive roster. (Patchan was moved to defensive line by coaches after his arrival and is currently expected to remain with the defense.) Patchan is 6'6" and listed at 265 lbs., but an injury sustained during his senior year of high school caused him to report in to Florida underweight at 238 lbs.

Gator fans are leery of bad news after Jamar Hornsby's felonious use of a dead woman's credit card, leading to his dismissal from the team last week. Meyer's quick support of Patchan makes it seem likely that Patchan was an unfortunate victim in the wrong place at the wrong time.

*Actually not an old saying, but a dumb saying that was just invented. By me.

(Former?) Florida safety Jamar Hornsby is in trouble. Trouble with the law, yeah. But you have to wonder about the soul of this guy -- this is pretty disturbing stuff.

Florida football players wear a black circle on their helmets with the word "Sunshine" on them. Purpose: honor the memory of fallen teammate Michael Guilford, who died in a motorcycle accident last October. That accident also claimed the life of his passenger, Ashley Slonina, who was reportedly the girlfriend of cornerback Joe Haden.

Somehow, in the aftermath of the accident, Slonina's credit card found its way into Hornsby's hands. EDSBS claims Hornsby stole the card when he was helping Haden clean out Slonina's apartment shortly after she died. Precisely however or whenever Hornsby managed to pilfer the plastic is not officially known, but what we do know is that Hornsby used the card 70 times, the first being the day after Slonina's death, and racked up $3,000 worth of debt for Slonina's grieving parents over the course of the past six months.

When a judge issued a warrant for his arrest, Hornsby surrendered himself, was briefly jailed, and subsequently released "own his own recognizance." His status with the football team is uncertain at this point.

"Old School" is the College Football FanHouse's irregular look back at the rich history of college football, usually through the medium of embeddable flash video. Check out the Old School archive for more famous plays and infamous hair.

Step back in time with me, college football fans, to an earlier era. Here we have the Seminoles of Florida State taking on the Florida Gators in 1973.



This is pre-Ben Hill Griffin stadium stuff, so that's just Florida Field. Note that the Swamp is highly recognizable. Back then the stadium was painted blue rather than orange but "This is... Gator Country!" is still scribed on those trademark vertical walls rising out of the east and west stands. The press box was a tad smaller back then, too, as you might notice.

Florida's mascot was in a woeful state in those days. "Albert E. Gator" looked like an inflatable green jalapeno with teeth and a tail.

As for the game itself? Florida routed the Seminoles 49-0. For the rivalry, it was an era which favored the Gators, who won 9 straight from 1968-1976. Today, Florida leads the overall series, 30-19-2, but FSU is 17-15-1 against the Gators under Bobby Bowden.

LSU's fantastic quarterback talent, Ryan Perilloux, has finally been dismissed from the team:

Head coach Les Miles says that Perrilloux "didn't fulfill his obligation as an LSU student-athlete." He is declining additional comment.

LSU said Friday that Perrilloux is expected to finish out the spring semester at the school.

Thus ends a tumultuous, occasionally brilliant, and often frustrating tour in the bayou for Perilloux, who led LSU to a victory over Tennessee in last year's SEC title game. Perilloux was slated to start in 2008.

What did Perrilloux in? Simply put, it was his nose for trouble. Perrilloux was suspended no less than three times in the past 12 months, and was becoming a major distraction for the team even in the off-season when he was late for team practice, suspended, and then reinstated.

Despite his talent, Perrilloux would have been a poor senior leader for LSU. FanHouse is pleased with Les Miles' decision: despite forcing Tiger fans to endure a season without one of their key playmakers, Miles is sending a signal that LSU football is more important than one player.

As for Perrilloux? He will probably land on his feet. Any number of college programs will be anxious to acquire the dual-threat quarterback's services despite his off-field transgressions. After transferring and sitting out a year, expect to see Perilloux pop up at another Div-IA (excuse me, FBS) program.

The problem with creating rules to try to force all college football coaches to be lazy recruiters, is that some of them just won't. When the NCAA tried to "fix" the so-called "bump" rule, they did in in a way that makes sense only to those who value, for example, duck hunting over college recruiting. Instead of allowing coaches to evaluate players during the "Spring Evaluation Period", they have to sit back on their campuses and wait for someone else to tell them how great some player is.

FanHouse's own Brian Cook described the rule this way:

It looks like the NCAA is moving to lessen the impact of the "bump" rule and provide a level playing field for coaches from enthusiastic frequent NCAA violators to guys who can't be bothered to get out of bed in March

Of course, the new NCAA rule "leveled the playing field" by catering to the laziest common denominator. It's about like making the no-huddle offense illegal because some teams don't have the personnel to run it. Or canceling a playground kickball game because you don't want to hurt the feelings of the kid who gets picked last. What most will be unsurprised to learn is that artificially induced slothfulness doesn't work.

With so many changes afoot in the Tennessee football program, FanHouse decided it was best to go to the horse's mouth of Vol blogdom. We caught up with Joel at RockyTopTalk.com for a few words about the '08 Tennessee Volunteers.

FanHouse: You've got Erik Ainge and others in the NFL draft. How's it looking for those guys?

Joel: Jerod Mayo is most likely the head of the class, with some draft gurus saying he could go as high as 15th overall. He's a prototypical John Chavis linebacker and should do well. David Cutcliffe, the Manning Maker, says that whoever drafts Erik Ainge is going to get a bargain, a statement that essentially acknowledges that he's not going to go as high as he should. It's a shame, because he's very, very good. After that, tight end Brad Cottam seems to be getting the most interest. He was injured most of his senior season, but stellar days at the Senior Bowl and the NFL Combine improved his draft stock significantly.

Very encouraging is the apparent fact that coach Fulmer is indeed letting new offensive coordinator Dave Clawson run his own offense. The simple fact of change is refreshing, and Clawson's insistence on getting the ball to playmakers in space has Vol fans breathing heavy. The spring game proved that he's not only saying the things Tennessee fans want to hear, he's actually doing them. The offense looked shiny and new, and they had a great deal of success last Saturday.

Usually spring is the season of unbridled (and in many cases, unrealistic) optimism for college football fans. Not so in Columbia, South Carolina.

An unspectacular recruiting season combined with disarray at the quarterback position (redshirt frosh Stephen Garcia was cited for underage drinking last month, his fourth offense in his short tenure at South Carolina) set the stage for the Gamecocks' spring scrimmage. After Spurrier's last spring game put fans to sleep (it was a low-scoring, 14-7 affair) the Ol' Ball Coach enacted new rules for '08: no pass rushing, no blitzing, and the defense was forced to play one of three base coverages.

Sounds like a recipe for an offensive extravaganza, right? Nope: QBs Chris Smelley and Tommy Beecher combined for 8 interceptions versus the declawed 'Cock defense.

Add to this the fact that Spurrier has designated his son, Steve Spurrier Jr., as the new playcaller. And, yes, Junior was calling the plays. For both offenses.

Does Spurrier have one foot out the door already at South Carolina? If Spurrier fails to produce a competitive team in this, his fourth year in Columbia, you've just gotta wonder. The OBC is grooming his son for the head coaching job, hasn't been lighting it up on the recruiting trail, and has already been in public scrapes with the university over admissions issues. Gamecock fans are nervous about what ROI might come from their pricey head coach in his remaining time in the Palmetto State, and rightfully so.

From inside the pages of the venerable Pro Football Weekly 2008 Draft Guide:

49ers head coach Mike Nolan told PFW to watch out for this kid. We did. He stinks. Hall was virtually non-existent all week, hardly making a peep. He supposedly was nursing an injury, but it didn't stop him from playing in the [Senior Bowl].

Ouch.

Rarely do you see respected publications straight up say a player stinks. Bonus points for throwing a coach under the bus. Rough day at the office, perhaps?