LIKE IT IS : Meyer, Saban, Petrino bring home best grades
Posted on Sunday, December 7, 2008
For SEC football teams, the semester is over, but eight of the 12 teams will get a chance for extra credit in bowl games. With the SEC Championship Game now in the history books, here is one opinion of how the coaches did this season:
EASTERN DIVISION FLORIDA Urban Meyer gets an Aminus. The Gators lost at home to Ole Miss, and that keeps him from having a perfect score. He did have the Gators peak at the right time. GEORGIA Mark Richt gets a Bminus, and that was almost a C-plus. The Bulldogs started the season No. 1 in many polls and were penciled in for the BCS championship. Instead, they tripped themselves three times, including a loss to Georgia Tech. VANDERBILT Bobby Johnson gets a C-plus, but it should have been higher. Vanderbilt raced out to a 5-0 start and finished 6-6, which will probably earn the Commodores a trip to the Music City Bowl right there in Nashville, Tenn. The upside is they won’t have to spend much time or money for travel. SOUTH CAROLINA Steve Spurrier gets a C. The Gamecocks struggled at quarterback, and much of that blame goes to Spurrier, who seemed to change his mind every time the wind blew. KENTUCKY Rich Brooks gets a Cminus. The Wildcats started the season with a lot of enthusiasm by knocking off four nonconference opponents (Louisville, Norfolk State, Middle Tennessee and Western Kentucky ) but struggled big time in SEC play, beating Mississippi State and somehow, in a weird game, downing Arkansas. The very weak nonconference schedule allowed them to get bowl-eligible. TENNESSEE Phil Fulmer gets a D. Don’t mean to pile on a guy who got fired, but these Vols underachieved big time. The thing is, there is a chance that in the very near future the fans who wanted him gone will wish he hadn’t left.
WESTERN DIVISION ALABAMA Nick Saban gets an Aminus. It is a coaching grade, not one for congeniality. The Crimson Tide was picked third in the West but ran the table in the regular season before coming up short in the SEC Championship Game. MISSISSIPPI Houston Nutt gets a B-plus. He inherited a much more talented team than he left behind at Arkansas and stumbled out of the gate with a 3-4 start, which included a great victory over Florida, but Ole Miss won the final five games and most likely earned a spot in the Cotton Bowl, which Nutt missed last year after resigning at Arkansas to go to Ole Miss. LSU Les Miles gets a D. The defending national champs were picked to win the SEC West, but after losing an overtime game to Alabama, the team seemed to lose heart and fell to Ole Miss and Arkansas to finish the season. ARKANSAS Bobby Petrino earned an A-minus. Petrino inherited a team with one potential All-SEC player (Jonathan Luigs ) but managed to work in 16 true freshmen and get within a game of being bowl-eligible. Heartbreak losses to Kentucky, South Carolina and Mississippi denied the Hogs extra practice time for a bowl, but it allows the staff to turn its full attention to recruiting. AUBURN Tommy Tuberville gets a C-plus. Considering he had to fire his offensive coordinator in the middle of the season, this became one very strange season down on the Plains. Winning only five games when Alabama is ranked No. 1 in the nation put enough pressure on him that he accepted a $ 5. 1 million buyout. Officials are claiming they begged him to stay, but if that were totally true, why pay the buyout ? MISSISSIPPI STATE Sylvester Croom gets a C. Less than a year after being name the SEC Coach of the Year, he was bounced. All he did was graduate his players and get them to play hard and be good citizens. It appears the Bulldogs brass had no plan when it came to replacing him, unless they were waiting on Turner Gill.
The Most Valuable Player award for the coaches goes to Jimmy Sexton, the superagent who got Tuberville $ 5. 1 million and Fulmer $ 6 million golden parachutes, and got Nutt a raise and contract extension.
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