Scheduling complaint

I don’t think it’s fair that South Carolina plays Arkansas and Georgia doesn’t.

Toss it.

Mark Richt explains why Georgia is employing the toss much more this season:

The Bulldogs this season are utilizing the toss — or lateral — more often when they run the football. And unlike in past years, when that usually meant an outside running play, Georgia is doing it when it intends to carry the ball between the tackles.

That’s no accident. It’s a wrinkle the Bulldogs picked up from LSU, which utilized that tactic to great effect last year.

“It’s basically the old-school power,” Georgia coach Mark Richt explained. “We’ve handed it off over the years; most everybody in the country still hands it off. [But] LSU has been a team that’s tossed it like that and you could see the benefit of it on film when we watched LSU do it.”

Richt said the advantage of it is two-fold. One, it actually utilizes the quarterback as a blocker or even just a shield from back-side pursuit. It’s also “softens up” the linebackers, who normally read the toss as an outside play and simply get out to the perimeter as fast as they can. Now they need to be more careful to mind their inside gaps.

I haven’t noticed Aaron Murray blocking much on those plays (and I’m not sure I want to see that, anyway), but I see Richt’s point about getting the linebackers to shift out of their gap responsibilities.  Now, if only he had LSU’s offensive line depth at his disposal…

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“They should be a desperate team.”

Chris Gragg believes.

“We still feel like we’re a top 10 team,” Gragg said. “We have one blemish on our record, but we’re 0-0 in the SEC and we know that this is a big game. Like it always is every year I’ve been here, it has a lot of implications on what happens in the SEC.”

If the Hogs are still a top-10 team, what does that make UL-M?  According to Barnhart, richer:

Last week was a good one for Louisiana-Monroe (the alma mater of Timmy Brando) of the Sun Belt Conference. The Warhawks picked up a cool $950,000 to play Arkansas in War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock. But under the unique terms of the agreement ULM got to count it as a home game, boosting its overall attendance and thus helping the school maintain its requirements to remain the Football Bowl Subdivision. Then ULM had the temerity to beat No. 10 Arkansas in overtime, the biggest upset of this young season. It was the first win ever by the Sun Belt Conference over a top-10 team. They’ve even got the T-shirts: “The Shock in Little Rock.”

Well, if you think last week was good, what if ULM goes to Auburn on Saturday and wins? With QB Kolton Browning (42 of 67, 412 yards vs. Arkansas) the Warhawks certainly have a shot against Auburn (0-2), which is last in total defense in the SEC. And for those of you keeping score at home, ULM will be paid $1,050,000 for the visit to Jordan-Hare Stadium.

If UL-M wins this week, I may add the Warhawks to my SEC Power Poll ballot.

Georgia on his mind

Did Jarvis Jones get inside James Franklin’s head during last week’s game?  Franklin says, yeah.

Georgia had a very short field for two quick touchdowns off big plays by linebacker Jarvis Jones, a 21-yard interception return to the 1 and a forced fumble on a sack three plays later that gave the Bulldogs possession at the 5. Just like that, the deficit was an insurmountable 21 points.

“I would start to feel pressure that wasn’t even there,” Franklin said. “I was trying to anticipate the throw, so it was way off and incomplete, something like that. That was one thing that I definitely wanted to work on, just staying in there more and trusting a lot better.”

Hopefully he won’t be the last quarterback we hear that from this season.