Week 2 Review - Welcome Back to Earth

Welcome back to earth.  That is about all I can say to the people who spent the last 9 months building this Auburn team up to unattainable heights.  I would like to give a special "shout-out" to the elite few who talked about how our running would be as good as Bama's and how it would be one of the best in nation and how we would not miss Ben Tate.  Welcome back to earth.  It was a hard fall even for me.  The reason I am so disappointed in Auburn's performance Thursday night was because of how poor Mississippi State played on offense.  I was convinced they were better.  Their defense was better but their offense was not.  It looked a lot like every other Mississippi State offense I have seen.  The quarterbacks threw a lot of bad passes and the wide receivers had a lot of drops.  Now Auburn's defense did play much better and actually even challenged a few receivers at the line of scrimmage but the offense they were playing was just not that good.  I will be much more excited if we can put up a couple more of these performances in the next two weeks.

The simple fact is if Auburn does not play much better than that then they are going to have a tough time.  We played good defense but every single team remaining on our schedule outside of Ole Miss, Louisiana Monroe and Chattanooga will have a better offense and better quarterback.  I still believe Dan Mullen is a good coach and he is a "Cam Newton" away from resurrecting State's offense.  It is really that simple.  The recruiting battle for Newton came down to Auburn and Mississippi State.  How much different would things be last night if Cam Newton played for Mississippi State?

THE GOOD
Auburn's defense was good.  Nick Fairley was great.  He did resemble his legendary position coach last night.  Like last week I give props to "The Rock", Tracy Rocker.  His defensive line though it drops off a lot after Fairley is the only unit on the team that has been consistent both weeks.  They get after it all the time.  The rest of the defense was better than last week but Mississippi State still had a lot of open receivers and was an easy catch away from a possible tying field goal.  However I would agree that the defense got the job done.  They will need to keep improving because as I said the road just gets harder from here.

I also have to mention Mike Dyer here.  While he did not put on the performance Marcus Lattimore did for South Carolina he continues to show flashes of being that next great Auburn running back.  With Mario Fannin possibly out due to injury Dyer will be called on to do more.  I also thought that Cam Newton did not play a great game but still made some good plays and needed help from his coach...

THE BAD
Gus Malzahn.  The offense was completely ineffective in the second half.  Going to the swing screen once to often resulted in a "pick six" that was dropped by State.  We also seemed to have problems calling plays, problems calling audibles and seemed unable to handle undisguised blitzes.  It was mess and the worst I have seen a Gus Malzahn offense play.

Another thing to note is that in consecutive weeks, teams are sniffing out some of Malzahn's favorite plays.  Last week, Auburn torched Arkansas State but the one time they tried that reverse to Terrell Zachary that resulted in so many big plays last season it resulted in a huge loss.  Then as I said earlier Malzahn went to the swing screen one too many times.  Those are two pet plays Auburn runs a lot.  I also do not understand why Auburn did not throw any quick slants against those State blitzes.

THE UGLY
Ugly is the streak that Bama is on.  They were not perfect but they were dominant in taking out Penn State.  Now Penn State appeared to be an average Big Ten team at best but they are a legitimate big time out of conference opponent.  Unfortunately it has become obvious that Bama has one of those special groups of kids.  Like Auburn in the 80s when they won three consecutive SEC titles and Florida in the 90s when they won four consecutive SEC title.  It goes beyond the coach no matter how good he is.  It is recruiting mixed with good luck and outstanding chemistry.  They have that oneness that every coach dreams about.  Steve Spurrier did not just stop coaching and recruiting at Florida from 1997 on.  He just had that special group of kids from 1993 through 1996.  I think Bama has been a nick more successful because the SEC has been down the last couple of years except for Florida with their big rivals Auburn and Tennessee both going through tough coaching transitions plus LSU starting to fade as well.

AROUND THE SEC
The biggest win of the weekend was Steve Spurrier finally beating the Dawgs at South Carolina.  I do not think he has beat Georgia at South Carolina yet, if not he has only gotten them once and lost several heart breakers.  South Carolina had to win to have a chance at the East and they did.  Like I said last week this appears to be the strongest team I have seen at South Carolina under Spurrier (and they are due into Auburn next week).  The team as a whole has improved but the they also finally have that dynamic play maker Spurrier has lacked since he has been there in former Auburn commit Marcus Lattimore.  Lattimore was the MVP as he carried South Carolina across the finish line rushing 37 times for 182 yards.  On the other sideline, Georgia played well but made some key mistakes.  It was be interesting to see where Georgia goes from here.

As I stated above, Bama dominated Penn State and in the other big out of conference game Oregon overcame a slow start to crush the Vols in Knoxville.  The honeymoon ended for Derek Dooley in the second half of this game.  I did not see it but I have heard it got very ugly.  It is obvious now that while Phil Fulmer was fading that the hiring of Lane Kiffin was one of the biggest mistakes in Tennessee football history and they are going to pay for it for awhile.  I read that they are now down to 72 scholarship players???  It is going to take some serious rebuilding to get the Vols back to the top.  Everyone else in the SEC held serve over weaker opponents.

This coming week gives us more conference matchups with the Florida going to Knoxville, Arkansas going to Athens, Mississippi State going to Baton Rouge and finally last and least Vandy heads to Oxford for a matchup of the two worst teams in the conference.  There will also still be some good out-of-conference matchups with Clemson and ESPN Gameday coming to the loveliest village on the plains.  Auburn and Clemson is a special matchup with the two schools being so similar and sharing a lot of history.  I cannot wait.  Alabama and their legion of fans will invade Duke's tiny Wallace Wade Stadium.  I hope Duke is ready because they are about to see the following a #1 SEC team.  That campus will be crimson till the game is over.  You would think Duke would coordinate a basketball series with the football series so they could flex their muscles in their sport.  Finally South Carolina and Kentucky take on a couple of cupcakes to get ready for their big week four games.