Chris Low points out a couple of good ones:
- Georgia coach Mark Richt is 33-6 (.846) in true road games and actually has a better record on the road than he does at home or at neutral sites. He’s 47-11 (.810) at home and 10-11 (.476) at neutral sites.
- Knocking off nationally ranked teams has been a struggle for Steve Spurrier at South Carolina. He was 2-1 against ranked foes during his first season in Columbia in 2005, but has gone just 5-14 since.
Get The Picture 
Another stat that works against these is that Spurrier has been very good against the spread. I don’t think he’s lost any games in which we’ve been favorites other than those two Vandy games. Not sure if that stat matters all that much, though, since we’ve rarely been favored against good teams. It might say more bad about us than good, actually.
Also, the only home loss we’ve had since mid-2008 was against top-ranked Florida last year.
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But don’t forget, that the only OTHER home loss that you’ve had since EARLY — I mean 1 month prior to MID-2008 (vs LSU, 10/18/08) — was to Georgia. Simply omitting statistics for the sake of painting a garnet-colored picture on your unfortunate misfortune today is a tactic worthy of ridicule.
Go Dawgs!
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Hmm. Maybe I should have mentioned that about Georgia, but at the same time, it was no more worthy of ridicule than SB’s omission of the stats I mentioned. Which is to say, not really at all. There’s a statistic for every flavor.
I guess it is gameday, though, so ridicule on.
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I’m lazy, so I just took a quick look at Steele for the ATS numbers under Spurrier. Here they are, though 2008:
2005: 6-6
2006: 9-3
2007: 5-5-1
2008: 5-6-1
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Hmm. I must be thinking about Ws and Ls versus being favored / underdog.
My bad. I’m the lazy one. That said, I’ll take a one-point victory today, even if it doesn’t cover the spread.
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Not suggesting you are doing so, but what fan takes solace in thier team covering the spread anyway???
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No one should, especially when it ends up a loss. Like I said, I’m more concerned about the fact that Spurrier has typically won the games he was supposed to. Although, again, I’m not really sure this one qualifies for being a game we’re supposed to win. We’re favored, but I’m aware that UGA is probably more talented and is very dangerous. It’s not like being favored against Kentucky.
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Quick Predicts:
UGA 28 S.Car 17
UF 21 S.Fla 10
MICH 24 ND 17
FSU 28 OU 20
ORE 31 TENN 10
OSU 27 MIA 14
BAMA 30 PSU 17
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So what you are saying is Spurrier had most of his success at USCe with Holtz players?
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Excuse me. Mark Richt is .687 in away games if you count the UGA-FLA game played in Jacksonville, FL as an away game (which it really is). Chris Low needs to get his facts right and to quit manipulating data to get it to say what he wants it to say.
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Did you guys see the spot by the ref at the SC 33 on SC’s third down in the second quarter? 80,000 people in the stands and 50,000,000 people saw that the SC receiver was short. The TV commentators said so, too. But the SEC ref pushed the ball up to give SC a first down and the guy in the TV booth can’t see that after multiple looks? Another year of crooked SEC refs.
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Great call. I got no problem with it.
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We should have just kept Willie if this is what we were going to get.
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Would much rather have Grantham than Willie, but we knew our defense was going to be hit or miss this year with the new scheme, and trying to teach the men not to play like they did for Willie. We still have a long road ahead of us, but we could be losing much worse than we are now. Let’s hope our defense doesn’t give up like we did against UF ’08.
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There is still a Johnny’s and Joe’s problem.
Willie was the X’s and O’s problem.
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Dude, we would have got beaten 38-6 today if we had Willie. Last year Garcia looked like an all-american against us, you will notice that today, umm, he didn’t. Lattimore is a load and is going to give a lot of people problems, they scored 17 points today. We had some chances and didn’t make plays but at the end of the day I think we lost to a pretty good team on the road.
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+1. How many games do you win only scoring 6 points? The D will be OK. The D held a good offensive team to 17 points. That wins most of the time. The problem really was on O. The O line is not living up to its rep.
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We’re not tackling and we are blowing coverage… Not a good combination ever much less on the road in the SEC.
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The OL is not living up to expectations. Still believe the Dawgs will have a good year But USCe is the team to beat in the SEC east. We need # 8 & a passing attack to be sucessful.Ealey is good but the Ol is not opening up any running room for him.The D will get better (I hope).
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They (OL) certainly aren’t as good as hyped.
However, our best (eligible) offensive player fumbled on the 5. Can’t blame that on the O-line.
#8 would’ve helped but we’ve got more issues than that. SC is good. Lattimore might be best RB since RUN DMC.
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Chin up Dawgs. Still gonna be fine.
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Couldn’t agree more. At least UGA will have plenty of film to review so that they can hopefully eliminate some of these mistakes next week. I am a little concerned about our red zone offense. I really feel like we left points on the field on that first drive between the over throw to Gray or the drop by Charles (even though the ball was behind).
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We need somebody else calling our plays. Bad is all I can say. Not really, damn it was dumb.
The fumble just is one of those things but if our thumb wasn’t up our butt we could have recovered from that. Damn.
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First, while the D was not as good as we had hoped it is still early in the season and the D is a work in progress. The D will come around and be good. If Ealey doesn’t fumble and the Dawgs score on that drive it’s a different ballgame. All is not lost. South Carolina still has to play Bama and FLA. If UGA runs the table from here on (the Dawgs can do it) UGA still wins the SEC East. Just need to keep a stiff upper lip and finish strong. Kick ass on ARK next week!
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While the D scheme itself may be a work in progress, it was suffering from the exact same maladies that infected us last year.
Not wrapping up, shoulder tackling, not playing the ball. Rambo in particular played a poor game.
Running game was bad between the tackles, and that fumble inside the 5 proved to be a killer.
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It’s frustrating, but I think we need a little patience. I saw our defense in position to make plays nearly every play, but they couldn’t make the tackle. I have a feeling they’ve spent so much time trying to learn the new scheme that fundamentals have suffered some, but that can be corrected with time. It wasn’t great, but I still saw a lot of potential in the defense for the future.
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Mayor of Dawgtown…I would drink the same cool-aid that you are! What did you see today that gives you hope for our D? I saw a ton of missed tackles and a D-line that was manhandled as Lattimore ran just south of 200. Yes, we did get some pressure on Gracia at times, which was nice. Just curious to see if I missed something.
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Man is the most overrated O-line in the country or what? Wow!! We should have manhandled USC!
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Tech lost! Now I feel better.
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Gosh, sloppy tackling, getting knocked off the ball at the point of attack….Gosh, I thought Willie was gone.
If we play hard, have a little luck, we might finish third in the east.
Oh Lord, more Indy Bowl jerseys.
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Only 47 offensive plays run. Not much room for error on offensive with Lattimore eating the clock. Three good TD chances but we came away with 6 points.
They ran all over us, but I still think the UGA defense is improved. I’m trying not to overreact to this loss.
We had a chance to pull it out, but SC deserved the win. I think Lattimore is pretty special player and this performance may not look as bad when Lattimore torches some other teams.
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Our defense played great. We held them to 17 pts despite a zillion 3-and-outs.
I’m going to repeat what I’ve been saying for over a year. Bobo has to go. He is not a top flight caliber O coordinator. That is just a fact.
And I don’t care what stats you throw at me about how we ranked last year. We were in 3 or 4 “track meet” games that inflated those numbers.
Nobody has feared our offense in at least 5 years.
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Defense got pushed around in the 1st half. We have zero pass rush with 3 lineman
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I’m with ya there Muck. Anytime we travel on the road and still hold our opponent to 2 td’s, you expect to win. Throw in the fact that this is still a new D with a learning curve, I have no complaints (yet).
But that O….I have been whining about Bobo about as long as you. Anytime the Dawgs get in the red zone and I know what they are going to do, I’m pretty sure Ellis Johnson knows it, too.
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I do miss the way Richt went for the jugular when he was OC. Our scoring drives require many more plays under Bobo on average. That’s one of the reasons we get fewer possessions each game. If it takes 12 or 13 plays, odds are someone will make a mistake and fumble or get called for a drive killing penalty.
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While today certainly doesn’t show it, Bobo has been much better in the red zone that Richt. Why do you think Billy Bennett was such a prolific scorer for UGA? Richt never could punch it in.
We’ll be fine. Murray played well, and I thought we took what SC gave us. Unfortunately that wasn’t much.
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I agree that Bobo is better in the red zone, but Richt scored often on big plays before getting to the red zone. The red zone success alone doesn’t make Bobo better than Richt. I just think Bobo is too conservative getting down the field. These kids make too many mistakes to sustain 12 play drives. It would be nice to score from the 40 or 50 once in a while.
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Regression to the mean…
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That spot was ridiculous, and it happened a half dozen other times.
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+1. Too often to be just bad officiating.
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I agree we need more than that But if we continue to have problems running the ball then we will have to pass & Murray appears capable of doing that. Having # 8 would help any QB in that situation.
If Ealey doesn’t fumble the game is closer but the better team won today.They remain my pick to win the East.I have not written off the Dawgs yet.
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Well, it sucks to lose, but USCe was clearly better today. We could’ve stolen the game if we don’t fumble on the 5, but then we wouldn’t have had the ball if they didn’t fumble. We need to be meaner. Too much standing around and too many arm tackles.
Still, the day wasn’t a total wash. Tech got beat at Kansas, the same Kansas that lost at home last week to 1-AA North Dakota State 6-3.
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1 lots of standing around. We looked tired.
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To add to the Yech comment, it was great seeing how the Genius managed to lose the game today, by trying to transform Nesbitt into Johnny Unitas. Of course, that stout Kansas d-line is hard to run on.
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Tech may have lost, but the offense did not. The Coach Paul Johnson Offense is still lifetime undefeated-just ask CPJ.
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Re: play calling. I think CMR & CMB are involved in the game planning & the play calling. I also had no major problems with the play calling particularly since we had so few opportunities.
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The hand-off out of shotgun with about 1:20 left in the half on 2nd and 7 around our 40 was a horrific, mind-boggling play call. I am still trying to figure that one out.
It seems like Bobo is just picking ’em out of a hat at times.
And please scrap the wildcat bullshit.
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The wildcat is a decent wrinkle when it is unexpected.
When we line back up in it after having to call a TO while lined up in it is just silly.
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I never want to see the wildcat/dog again.
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i thought the two positives from this game were murray (he’s got a lot of upside) and the 2nd half performance of the defense. halftime adjustments were a huge problem for willie, so today’s game does indicate progress on that front.
while bobo still displays the ability to dial up just the wrong play at the worst moment, the biggest problem with the offense that i can see is that it is incredibly predictable. it’s true that we got manhandled (and let’s put down the idea that we’ve got a great o line: we don’t), but part of the reason that happened is that our offensive formations don’t exploit the biggest advantage the offense has at the snap of the ball–making the defense guess run or pass. we make it *way* too easy for opposing defenses.
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I agree we are predictable–but especially on 3rd down. We had 11 third downs, and Murray handed it off only once (Ealey stopped short on 3rd and 2). 10 of 11 times on 3rd down, Murray dropped back to pass.
Looking at it more closely, Bobo really had no choice but to throw on third down. We had 3rd and 2 on two occasions. But eight of the 3rd downs were long yardage of 7 yards or more. That made it easy for SC to guess pass.
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We threw away a pile of first and/or second downs by running up the middle when it was apparent that SC was committed to stuffing the run. We had success passing the ball, but once we moved the chains we went right back to the ineffective runs. I felt like we handicapped ourselves by wasting downs running and only having 1 or 2 chances to convert instead of 3. Offensive balance should be a means to an end, Coach Bobo, not a goal.
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You are right there. We averaged 10 yards per pass attempt, which is excellent. But only 3 yards per rush. But we seem committed to 55% rush attempts regardless of success. It was pretty clear by late in the first quarter that we were not going to run many offensive plays so maybe we should have stuck to throwing it when we did get the ball.
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Jesus people, talk about a “predictable offense”? Start with handing the ball off 38 times to a freshman RB! If we could tackle consistently well then *maybe* SC would have been forced to change. The problem with our offense is that our line is severely overrated and we have a very young (but capable) QB. How many times will our line be called “the best in the nation”? Best my ass!
Based on what I saw and what I have seen for every game since 2006 is that we will lose 3-4 games this year and talk about next year under the pretenses of the RB’s, QB, and other players who return, and how much improved we will be under Grantham year 2.
While I would like to hang my hat on that, the nagging concern that Richt has peaked at UGa continues to ring louder. I fully expect UGA to compete for and win an SEC once every four years. That is a rational expectation. But it’s not going to be this year, not with what I saw today, and that will be five years. You can either continue to hang your hat on next year or you can start to accept the difficult possibility that it’s time for a change at the top if you want to win championships again.
And for the record, I am neither mad not drunk. I suppose it says something when we lose an SEC game and I don’t feel bad in the least.
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James Madison beats VT, bwahhahahahahahahahaha!!!
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I’m glad Boise St. will get screwed by this.
Remember all that talk about how Boise St beating VT would hurt a 1 loss SEC champ’s chances of playing in the MNC game? Remember when we thought that could possibly affect us?
Thanks to Bobo and company, we won’t have to worry about that scenario this season.
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ACC football blows: VT lost to James Madison, GT lost to Kansas, Miami lost to Ohio State, FSU got blasted by Oklahoma, and Virginia will lose to USC later tonight.
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Damn, it’s dark in here.
Senator, may we please have your breakdown of the Tek performance (sic).
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It’s odd, I suppose, but I actually took more positive away from this game than I have some victories in the past. I think the potential for this team is quite high. It sucks losing, to anybody, but it happens. I think the defense got ground down a bit, but they responded well and more or less shut down SC in the second half. 17 points is hardly terrible, even if Lattimore did have an exceptional day. On offense, I thought we ran the ball decently though not great (not sure what happened to Caleb). We handcuffed Murray a bit, but we all said he just had to be safe with the ball and get it to our playmakers. Richt and Bobo were calling the game they thought gave us the best chance, and it came close to working. I think Murray has earned more trust and will get a few more pages from the playbook going forward. There will be some costs to that, but by and large I think we are going become more explosive on offense and more solid on defense as the season goes on.
That said, the margin for error in the SEC is razor thin. No one on our schedule is a pushover, and we’ll need better execution than we saw today to be succesful. The pressure is definitely on now that we are a game down.
This was not a great start, but it’s how you finish that matters.
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+1
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Well, since the regular season is a playoff, I guess we can consider it over – right Blutarsky?
I’m just so pumped that we’re now in the hunt for the Tampax Tackle Softly Bowl!!!
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LOSS 6-17 South Carolina 2010
LOSS 27-34 Kentucky 2009
LOSS 17-41 Florida 2009
W 34-10 Vanderbilt 2009
LOSS 19-45 Tennessee 2009
W 41-37 South Carolina 2009
W 14-7 South Carolina 2008
W 26-14 Tennessee 2008
W 24-14 Vanderbilt 2008
LOSS 10-49 Florida 2008
W 42-38 Kentucky 2008
LOSS 12-16 South Carolina 2007
LOSS 14-35 Tennessee 2007
W 20-17 Vanderbilt 2007
W 42-30 Florida 2007
W 24-13 Kentucky 2007
W 18-0 South Carolina 2006
LOSS 33-51 Tennessee 2006
LOSS 22-24 Vanderbilt 2006
LOSS 14-21 Florida 2006
LOSS 20-24 Kentucky 2006
LOSING RECORD FIVE (5) YEARS VS SEC EAST 10-11
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Ugh. That is ugly.
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We are also 10-2 against the SEC West over that same stretch, you can’t just throw that out, it makes for 20-13 in our conference the last five years, considering our conference has produced the last four national champions I don’t think that’s too bad, hell only three teams in our conference had winning conference records last year (UF, Bama, and LSU). I also would point out that we would have gone 5-5-1 in those 11 games you point out that we lost had we held the opponent to 17 points.
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Add to that that we ALSO are # 2 in Fulmer Cup over the same last 5 years,
And, it is WAY BEYOND UGLY
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I have a couple of questions, Senator.
1. How do both Holliman and Latimore play for USC wearing the same number–21?
2. Is Holliman trying to win the Brandon Spikes award? There is a play in the third quarter–I think with about 9 1/2 minutes left–where Lattimore places his hand and arm behind Ealey, while he (Lattimore) is on the ground and pounds on Ealey’s knee with his other hand.
I cannot fathom how the crack team of Mutt and Jeff missed this, in their excellent coverage of the game.
Everytime I go to Columbia for the game I swear it will be my last time. Crappy town, parking, and stadium. Spurrier, however, was worth the price of admission. He never fails to be an ass.
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Since the Senator has not answered your queries, permit me to act in his stead: (1) There are only so many numbers available and sometimes players are issued the same number. Backs, and DBs have the same series numbers. Linemen (O&D) have a different series. Sometimes all the numbers in a series are taken so duplicates have to be given. I think sometimes the coaches let players have a favorite number even if it is taken to make the player happy. I would bet such was the case with Lattimore, a freshman, who only joined the team this year. 21 was probably his HS number and it was already taken by Holliman. That is not as critical now because the players all have their names on their jerseys. (2) Imagine that! Mutt and Jeff missing what was going on during the game. It must have been while they were doing the “Davie Jones Locker” thing. What is really disturbing is that the REFS did not see it or do anything about it! P.S. Please don’t say anything positive about Spurrier even in jest (“worth the price of admission”). It will only encourage him.
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Were in the heck is AJ
I saw him play in Summerville.He was awesome..
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