AUBURN, Ala. -- It just might be Alabama's biggest success story this season.
For an offensive line that lost All-Americans Andre Smith and Antoine Caldwell and opened the year with three first-time starters, the Tide's unit has come together just fine this season, thank you. The O-line will get another opportunity to show off in Friday's Iron Bowl against an Auburn defense that ranks last in the SEC in scoring defense (27 points per game) and ninth in total defense (359.2 ypg).
"I don't know if it was as much of a motivating factor as much as we just knew that we had to come to work," senior left guard Mike Johnson said of preseason questions surrounding the line and if those concerns served as motivation.
You need Les Miles on that wall, you want Les Miles on that wall. And as you can see from the latest damning YouTube video, the Zapruder film of clockgate, not only did Miles signal for the clocking/spike (which today he denied), but he also screamed it as he was running down the sideline and gesturing it with both arms.
Oh, and then for good measure, as the game ended, he turned to the cop charged with protecting him and asked if LSU had any timeouts left.
On Saturday, LSU's Jordan Jefferson made the inexplicable decision to spike the football with only one second remaining in the game. Spiking the football ended the game and negated two miraculous Milacles: first, Les Miles' Tigers recovered an onside kick and then they completed a 46-yard Hail Mary. In his postgame news conference Miles claimed that he didn't know who had instructed Jefferson to spike the football. "I do not know who told him to clock [spike] it," Miles said.
Except, you guessed it, Miles himself was displaying his uncanny acumen by calling for the ball to be spiked with one second remaining on the clock. That's something that you can clearly see on this video after the jump. And yet another reason why LSU fans are still staring morosely at the waters on the bayou, shaking their heads, drinking Jax beers, and cursing the day that Les Miles didn't leave for Michigan.
Uga VII, not surprisingly, the son of Uga VI, succumbed to an unexpected heart illness Thursday. The Bulldog mascot, in just his second year prowling the sideline, was only four years old. Presumably, he is survived by many other dogs given that Georgia uses lineal descendants to anoint the next mascot. The mascot-less Georgia team will play on Saturday against Kentucky without their English bulldog on the sideline. In a show of support, the entire team will lick their balls at halftime.
CBS carries the SEC Game of the Week into living rooms across the nation every weekend. CBS' deal is the only national broadcast of any collegiate conference. (Independent Notre Dame, of course, has an eight-game deal with NBC.) ABC also carries football games on network television. But the ABC games, featuring Big Ten, ACC, Big 12, Pac-10, and Big East teams are carried regionally. That means ABC carries teams split geographically, which would theoretically lead to higher overall ratings. That's been the case every year.
Until now.
For the first time since CBS added the SEC in 1996, the SEC games are outdrawing their regional counterparts on ABC. This season's SEC ratings are up 29 percent over comparable ratings last season. Given that CBS still has Alabama-Auburn and what will probably be the highest rated game of the season prior to the BCS bowls, Florida-Alabama in the SEC championship game, CBS and the SEC are likely to triumph over ABC for the season.
Should the SEC thank Tim Tebow? Maybe so. But even without Tebow, does this represent a fascinating turn in the ratings game? I think so. Read on for seven reasons why this is incredibly significant.
Okay, Greg McElroy admits he overreacted and his feelings were hurt.
It was two Saturdays ago, following Alabama's dramatic victory over LSU, when McElroy vented that people, including teammates, had lost faith in him as the Crimson Tide's starting quarterback. Two days later, McElroy apologized if his postgame comments offended anyone and he further explained that getting mad was not the way to getting better.
McElroy was certainly better in Alabama's 31-3 victory over Mississippi State last Saturday, silencing critics with a solid performance he intends to build on as the undefeated Crimson Tide (10-0, 7-0 SEC) continues its march towards the SEC Championship Game in Atlanta.
While No. 1 Florida and No. 2 Alabama each play glorified scrimmages on Saturday and continue their march to the SEC Championship game next month, one of the more intriguing conference match-ups features Kentucky at Georgia. Yes, Kentucky. Football.
The Wildcats have done an impressive job of persevering this season.
They will be searching for their first victory in Athens, Ga., since 1977 and can improve their bowl berth in the final two games of the regular season. Kentucky has also won its last two road games for the first time since 2002 and has won four of its last five overall.
It's that silly time of year again. There are so many significant teams among the big boys of college football, but there are just two slots on Jan. 7 in Pasadena, Calif., for that title game of the Bowl Championship Series. So the voice of the older Jim Mora is screaming in my subconscious.
Twenty-year-old Corey Zickefoose was the victim of an alleged crime Thursday when three Tennessee football players were arrested on charges of armed robbery. Nu'Keese Richardson, Janzen Jackson and Michael Edwards allegedly held up Zickefoose with an air gun in what was later described as a "prank."
Intentions aside (as they do pave the road to hell), one would think Zickefoose would be in full-on lawyer mode, lining up a civil suit and pressing criminal charges. Or at least really angry. But no -- unbelievably, he's asking the university for leniency instead.
On Saturday, LSU's 
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Twenty-year-old Corey Zickefoose was the victim of an alleged crime Thursday when three 
