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Week 11

Opponent:  Kentucky Wildcats

Kickoff:  7:45 PM

TV: ESPN2

Quite possibly our most complete game of the year.  By no means perfect, in a year where we’ve looked so inconsistent so often, it looked like a dream come true.  The rest of the SEC East has fallen apart worse than we have and a win Saturday claims us outright 2^nd place in the East.  Up next is a Kentucky team that is solid, so we can’t afford to look ahead to a certain matchup with a top-10 state school to close out the season.

About the Auburn game…­­­­­­

The Good: Pretty much everything that happened in the last three quarters.  The defense played like we had hoped they might all year, holding a pretty efficient offense to 3 points over the final 45+ minutes of game time.  Despite the loss of AJ Green, the offense was able to put together some drives and we found explosiveness from a few different spots, something we had also waited all season for.  The team forced turnovers and gave away none, a novel approach to the game.

The Bad: The first quarter defense was about as bad as we’ve seen all year, which is saying something.  The first quarter offense was about the same.  The worst thing was easily the injury to AJ Green given how key he is to our offense.  The injury to Rambo was scary and his loss hurts since he was certainly appearing to be ready to make an impact.

The Key: So many keys to this game, it’s really hard to pick just one.  The most obvious one though was the fact we forced Auburn, a team that doesn’t turn the ball over much, into a few turnovers and we, a team that has been more than willing to hand out a few, held onto the ball the entire game.  It’s amazing how much better your team looks when that happens.

UK Offense

• While UK is by no means an explosive offense (8^th in the SEC in scoring, 9^th in total offense), they weren’t last year either and they managed to hang 38 on us.  They also run that damnable Wildcat offense to great effect with a guy who had a career day against us last year.  In SEC play they haven’t scored more than the 26 they put up against SC.  They are a good running team but a pretty bad passing team, especially given injuries.
• At QB, starter Mike Hartline is out after injuries sidelined him.  True freshman Morgan Newton has taken over the starting spot but hasn’t been overly, not necessarily effective, let’s say impactful.  A highly regarded HS recruit from Indiana, he’s faced as easy a run of games since Hartline’s injury as you could hope to expect.  His only TD passes came against Eastern Kentucky.  UK obviously has been trying to win in spite of him rather than because of him, as he only attempted 38 passes in the 3 SEC games he’s started (Auburn, MSU, Vandy).  He’s mobile, but isn’t a breakaway threat.  They typically run a good bit of wildcat with super-soph WR Randall Cobb taking snaps but a shoulder injury at Vandy has him listed by Coach Brooks as “questionable at best.”
• Twin speedsters Derrick Locke and Alphonso Smith make up the UK ground game.  Locke is having a solid year, averaging right at 5 ypc.  He’d have more total yards but the UK offense spreads the ground game around a good bit.  Again, Newton will get some carries at QB and I’d imagine they’ll still use the wildcat package some since Cobb’s 57 carries and 7 rushing TDs (leads the team) are simply too much a part of the offense to scrap the whole thing if he’s out.
• It should come as no surprise that Randall Cobb leads the UK team in catches, yards and TDs.  They have 4 players with 10 or more receptions and with Cobb out that drops to 3.  RB Derrick Locke is one of those 3.  JUCO transfer Chris Matthews is a big target at 6-5, 210 and he’s the big threat with Cobb out, grabbing 28 passes for 299 yards and 2 TDs.  They have a ton of guys in that 5-9 catches range and I expect to see someone in that group have their best game of the season if Cobb can’t go.
• The UK OL sports 4 seniors and a sophomore, so they have some serious seasoning along the front.  They’ve done a great job of protecting the QB this year and are 4^th in the SEC in sacks allowed.  That’s likely skewed to the fact that they run the ball a good bit more, especially with the loss of Hartline, but with a true freshman back there you’d expect to see a lot more than the 6 sacks he’s taken in 5 games.
• Bottom Line: The UK offense isn’t exactly explosive to begin with.  If Cobb can’t go they lose by far the most explosive weapon they had.  Look for heavy, heavy doses of Locke and Smith as they try to pound the ball behind their big, experienced line.  That sets up well for us as we’re far better equipped to defend the run than the pass at this point. 
• Key Matchup to watch when they have the ball: Our DL should be good enough to hang with their OL and neutralize them up front, especially if they can’t establish a passing threat.  I think the matchup to watch is going to be Locke against Curran.  Statistically speaking Curran is having a fine year but his name doesn’t seem to get called nearly as much as it was in the past couple of years.  It’s always fun to watch that guy run around and if rumors are true that he’s likely headed to the NFL after this season I’d like to see him go out with a few big performances.  He should get plenty of chances Saturday.

UK Defense

• UK is feeling the brunt of losing 7 starters from last year, all of which signed with an NFL team.  This ain’t the UK of old, that’s for sure.  They’ve struggled some in the wake of that talent void but they still have some solid players and are doing a better than expected job this season.  They aren’t great against the run (11^th in the SEC) and really struggle to get to the QB (last in the SEC) but they can play some pass defense and have a couple of real playmakers and they’ve managed to pull out some solid performances to date.
• The UK DL returned only 1 starter from last year, senior DT Corey Peters, who is having a fine season.  Jr. Ricky Lumpkin has started every game opposite him and has been steady.  The ends were a question mark coming in and to a large extent still are.  JUCO transfer DeQuin Evans came in and has put together a solid season and leads the team in TFLs and sacks.  There’s a rotating bunch to nail down the other DE spot and they’ve really struggled to get consistency.  Coming into the season they did not have a DE that had recorded a collegiate tackle.  Ouch.
• The star of the UK LB corps is MLB Micah Johnson who is a load at 6-2, 260.  He’s a prototypical big athlete that can cover ground and strike folks.  He’s leading the team in tackles in his final season.  Sr. SLB Sam Maxwell is a beast as well and his 4 INTs leads the team.  All 3 LBs are currently the top 3 on the team in tackles.
• The star of the UK defense and its secondary is Sr. CB Trevard Lindley, a GA native.  At 6-1, 180, he’s got good size and has great speed and athleticism.  He’s missed 4 games this year with a high ankle sprain but he’s back healthy now and has played the last couple of games.  UK sports a strong, deep safety group led by senior Calvin Harrison.
• Bottom Line: UK’s strength on D is against the pass, with Lindley being a CB that you’d place on a guy like AJ Green and feel at least decent about your chances.  With Green out, Lindley’s impact could be neutralized somewhat since he can’t be used as a counter for our best weapon.  We’ve got a bunch of guys like Moore, King, Troupe, etc. that can be threats but aren’t the type of guys we’ll look at on every play like Green.  Either way I see us continuing to establish this running game that’s emerged with Washaun and Caleb playing off each other.  Establish that and mix in some play action passing and you’ve got the recipe for a solid offense, even without your best player. With that said, we need King or Troupe or someone to step in and be that deep threat that Green was from the day he stepped on campus.
• Key matchup to watch when we have the ball: Watch our RBs.  I’m thinking we’re going to be running the ball a good bit and it should be readily obvious if we’re successful.  If Ealey and King have some openings out there and we can ride those two guys through a suspect UK line then we could continue to have some success putting points on the board.

The UK Game Overall

This game is huge.  Sure it means nothing in terms of the SEC title.  Sure UK isn’t one of our traditional rivals.  That doesn’t mean the game isn’t big.  In a year where we looked set on our worst performance in the Richt era, if we win this game we seal 2^nd place in the SEC east outright.  Sure the season wasn’t a roaring success but I’ve been a UGA fan too long to not take some pleasure in the fact that we were able to finish 2^nd in the division in a down year.

In the end this game could show us how well this team can refocus after a big win.  We’re not a good enough football team to just throw our helmets (whatever color) out there and expect to beat a team as solid as UK.  We can’t overlook anyone at this point.  With a tangible result on the line (2^nd in the east), we shouldn’t have any issues getting up for this one despite it being sandwiched between Auburn and Tech.  Come out, hunker down, beat Kentucky, then focus on beating a GT team and trying to disrupt their miracle season.

Positional Notes

• Our DE play has really improved.  Not sure how much you’re paying attention, but Cornelius Washington and Justin Houston are absolute nightmares in passing situations and Dobbs and Wood have been solid against the run.  It took a while but they are here.
• It seems like Tavares King just has a knack for getting open deep.  I’d love to see us take several shots to him Saturday.
• Kevin Perez and Ricardo Crawford came to Athens without some of the accolades of their fellow classmates like Stafford and Moreno and they’ll never have seen any heavy playing time as they have both announced they are graduating with a year of eligibility left, but they put their blood and sweat into the scout team and helped this team get prepared for 4 years so they deserve our gratitude.
• The OL seems to be gelling somewhat although frankly Auburn’s DL isn’t very good and UK’s is probably worse.
• With Rambo out this week is this the week that Quintin Banks steps up finally?  Without him we’re looking at a very thin safety situation.
• Christian Robinson is really coming on at LB.

Random Thoughts

• Davie and Jones have skyrocketed to my least-liked announcing tandem…and they’re back this week.  They just have zero chemistry.  Jones hasn’t learned the art of working things into the broadcast smoothly, they just come off forced, like the whole thing about coaches’ salaries.  Davie, for a former big time coach, comes across stiff and doesn’t bring a whole lot of insight that you’d expect.  Neither appears to be very quick on their feet as they showed when they were convinced that Ealey should have been marked out at the 2 on his overturned TD despite the fact every 8-year old knows that you place the ball where it was when the player stepped out.  Just hard to believe this is the best ESPN could come up with.  Can we get Ron Franklin back please?  I loved that guy.
• And another thing, Davie’s injury assessment ability is bordering on absurd.  As if his insistence that AJ had hurt his wrist wasn’t bad enough, he was locked into the fact that Rambo had hurt his shoulder despite the fact he clearly had gotten knocked out.  Which brings me to the question, why is it that no announcers ever catch onto the fact that when a guy is knocked out when he gets clobbered or clobbers someone and goes down with his arms locked out directly in front of him?  It’s so obvious and you can see it from the stands yet I’ve got Bob Davie telling me on the 10^th replay of Rambo’s head snapping to the side that it’s clear he hurt his shoulder.
• Has there ever been a worse set of cutaways to downtown Athens during one of these night ESPN games?  I guess they were trying to play up the whole eclectic town thing, but it made it look like downtown Athens was all homeless people and musicians.  Wait a minute.  It’s not right?
• Granted there had not been a whole lot to cheer about at that point but when the fire baton girl get the loudest cheer of the game you know your team isn’t playing its best.  It is pretty fun to see the student sections respond loudly to her.
• The Meyer to Notre Dame rumor just won’t die.  I wonder if he left if they’d go after Stoops again.  I suppose Kelly at Cincinnati is the guy that makes the most sense, but you know ND wants to make a splash and hiring Kelly is more like a ripple.
• Can we just not give out a Heisman this year?  Seriously.  There’s no one that seems deserving although I get the feeling that if Houston Nutt had given Dexter McCluster as many touches early in the year as he’s getting right now not only would he be in the running but they wouldn’t have struggled so much early on.

As always,

Have a safe weekend,

Jody

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