So at least there’s that. After an inexplicable 7-point jump in the coaches’ poll (that Cap One win must’ve been more impressive than I remember), Georgia finishes the season ranked at #10. (#13 in the AP.)

That’s little consolation when you’re living in #1’s subdivision.

The Bulldogs fielded a pretty good team before Stafford and Moreno and will do so again next year, but that didn’t stop this headline from appearing on the Arizona Republic site:

Path to winning season easier for ASU football

By any measure, Louisiana-Monroe (for BYU) and QB Joe Cox/TBs Caleb King-Richard Samuel (for Stafford/Moreno) will make it easier for ASU to avoid a second straight losing season.

Arizona State hasn’t had consecutive losing seasons since 1946-1947 (impressive), and Dennis Erickson has never coached a college team to consecutive losing seasons. In fairness, the author isn’t chalking the Dawgs up as a win. “Of course ASU still has to play at Georgia on Sept. 26 with a new starting QB of its own so winning that game will be a stretch no matter what the Bulldogs personnel,” he cautions. Stafford and Moreno are the least of Erickson’s concerns when the Sun Devils make their return visit. For starters, they’ll have to improve on an offense that managed just 10 points against a Georgia defense that ended up averaging more than twice that.

Oh, and this guy will still be here.

I should admit straight off that I am of a like mind with other Georgia fans when it comes to how I *hope* the game turns out. I’d be giddy for days if we saw another 1995 national title game. I am also free of any confusing loyalties based on conference affiliation (though take what I wrote there about Ole Miss and Bama and reverse it, please). Tonight the SEC can rot. I think we’ll survive.

Bias can work both ways. It would be easy to jump from Georgia fan -> JEAN SHORTS -> Florida will lose. But the other side of bias is that we’ve seen, traumatically, what Florida can do. We’re not observers; we’re survivors. Victims. So it would be pretty easy to assume that every other school would kneel before Zod just as the rest of the SEC did in the second half of the season.

When so much of the attention is on individuals (Tebow vs. Bradford), it’s usually something else that will prove to be more important. We saw that in our own bowl game. It was all about Moreno vs. Ringer, but the difference in passing games is what ultimately separated Georgia from Michigan State.

Take the running game. Oklahoma will be absent DeMarco Murray, but Chris Brown is more than capable of carrying the load. A defense just can’t sit back and pick on Bradford; there’s a 1,100 yard rusher to worry about. Similarly, Florida isn’t just Tebow. They’ll use a cocktail of five or six players to move the ball on the ground from nearly every position and formation. Better defenses have slowed the Oklahoma running game, but Florida can hit you in more unpredictable ways.

The most interesting matchup tonight will be Florida’s defensive pressure against Oklahoma’s heralded offensive line. Brian Orakpo was able to break through, but the Gators, while talented, don’t have an Orakpo. We’ll see how creative Charlie Strong and company can be in creating pressure.

I’ve seen it mentioned a few times that Oklahoma didn’t see anything comparable to the Florida defense. That’s true, at least in conference play. Florida ranks high in both scoring defense and total defense. But the Sooners did play TCU with a defense that finished above Florida in both catagories. TCU showed, in games against Utah and Boise State, that their defense ratings weren’t flukes. The fact that TCU held Oklahoma to “only” 35 – their lowest total of the season – leads me to think that the score predictions I’ve seen with Oklahoma scoring in the 20s to low 30s just don’t hold water.

Who wins? I still have to go with Florida. Call it survivor shock. It might be their defense, running game, punt block unit (watch out for that), return teams, or even boring old Tebow, but they’re a complete team with the mindset to win. Doesn’t mean I won’t be hating life, especially when a blare of trumpets from the clouds heralds the announcement that the core of the team will be back next season.

Moreno and Stafford are gone, but every Georgia fan could see this coming. Have a trash can nearby. (h/t The Wiz).

Florida’s Tim Tebow, Brandon Spikes and Percy Harvin will announce whether they will leave school early for the NFL Draft within a week after Thursday’s BCS national championship game against Oklahoma.
The three, however, have already had discussions about possibly doing something the Gators’ ’04s basketball stars did in 2006: returning as a group.
“We have a lot of conversations about that issue all the time,” Spikes said.

Well of COURSE Florida’s Axis of Awesome will be back next year – intact. Could it go any other way?

Sure, Tebow says, “We’ll have to look at it and sit down after this game and really pray about it and try to figure out what’s best.” Fans of any other SEC school will tell you that “what’s best” will turn out to be touring and ministering on unicorns to impoverished nations in the offseason, putting the brakes on a global recession, releasing an album featuring John Legend and Beyonce, earning ATP pilot certification, representing Illinois in the Senate, and producing a library of 63 segments about themselves and their impact on humanity for ESPN’s use during the 2009 season that make us recall wistfully the understated and tasteful senior season of Joakim Noah.

And I say that as someone who watches a good bit of local high school ball on CSS.

Sportscasters have been making up words for years. There is a website dedicated to awful announcing. How many times have you heard “defensed” instead of “defended” or “get untracked” instead of “get on track?” This is football, not English class, right?

One of the FOX crew, Matt Vasgersian I believe, went into new territory last night. While pointing out the statistical advantage Ohio State had at one point in both yardage gained and time-of-possession, we were told that the Buckeyes had “out-yardaged” and “out-time-of-possessioned” the Longhorns. I almost expected to be told at the end of the game that Texas had out-touchdowned Ohio State.

I wonder if he was the same guy who later was unsure whether Ohio State would go for two after a touchdown closed the Texas lead to 17-15.

• Missouri goes to overtime with double-digit underdog Northwestern
• Oklahoma State can’t keep up with underdog Oregon
• Ole Miss shreds favored Texas Tech
• Even “split title” Texas in a win looks nowhere near as good as SoCal did against the Buckeyes.

Prior to the bowls, Oklahoma was the only Big 12 contender to play a decent nonconference schedule with opponents like TCU and Cincinnati. The rest sure are looking a lot like paper tigers now. The conference overall is 4-2 in bowls, but the mighty Big 12 South is 1-2 heading into the BCS title game.

Colt McCoy, though…wow. What a clutch player. If the coach-in-waiting’s defense could have held in Lubbock, we’d be talking about McCoy’s game-winning drive there that planted the Longhorns in the national title game. Even with the split title argument shot now, he was able to lead his team back again tonight from the brink of an upset. Tremendous player.

Today marks the final Cotton Bowl in the old Cotton Bowl stadium. The game will be moving to the shiny new home of the Dallas Cowboys next year. What better way for a Georgia fan to bid farewell than with a look back at our most memorable trip to Dallas?

Remember the Steve Spurrier who would call a pass to the end zone on 4th-and-a gazillion?

Yes, folks, that really was the Ball Coach, formerly of Bandits ball, and Gators offensive juggernauts, explaining why he kicked a field goal – a field goal! – with two minutes left in the game.
“Well, it was fourth and about 10, wasn’t it?” Spurrier said. “It was a long way. Just trying to put a few points up. 31-10 looks better than 31-7.”

With the season now behind us, we’ve entered the recruiting home stretch. There’s little more than a month left until Signing Day on February 4th. While Georgia already has much of a solid class committed, there are still a few undecided prospects who could really put Georgia over the top in terms of the best recruiting classes in the nation.

This weekend is significant because of the national All-Star games. You have the U.S. Army All-American Bowl in San Antonio on the 3rd (Noon, NBC) and the Under Armour All-America game in Orlando on the 4th (8 p.m., ESPN). Each game is sponsored in part by by rival recruiting services, so both games will showcase different top prospects.

U.S. Army A-A Bowl

• OL Chris Burnette
• OL Austin Long (injured)
• QB Aaron Murray

Under Armour A-A Game

• RB Washaun Ealey
• DL Abry Jones
• OL Dallas Lee
• LB Dexter Moody

Several other in-state commitments played in the Georgia North-South All Star Game on Tuesday.

In addition to those committed players, there are also several top uncommitted prospects in action. Receiver Marlon Brown (Under Armour), TE Orson Charles (U.S. Army), LB Jarvis Jones (U.S. Army), and DB Branden Smith (Under Armour) will be on display. Smith is expected to announce his college decision during the game, and Georgia is considered the favorite.

Confession time: I have no interest in pulling for other SEC teams in bowl games. I couldn’t care less where the SEC finishes on some contrived ESPN conference bowl scoreboard. It means nothing to me that the last two national champions are from the SEC if neither of those teams were Georgia.

I get why some fans chant "SEC! SEC!". It’s yet another identity through which we can (sometimes) claim superiority over some other group – especially Yankees or left coast liberals or some other set of people who don’t have the good sense to live in God’s country and follow a real football team. If our team can’t win the national title, at least someone from our conference can. Take that, Pac-10.

You can have it. If Alabama wins the Sugar Bowl, it won’t make them kicking our tails look any better. South Carolina’s disaster just down the road yesterday takes nothing away from my enjoyment of Georgia’s win. I smiled watching Shonn Greene run over South Carolina in between Garcia turnovers. I hope Florida has the same kind of success they enjoyed the last time they played a Big 12 team for the national title. Florida’s one hell of a team, but I still hope they flame out like the Cowboys last weekend. It won’t happen, but I’ll hold on to the dream.

Are there times I’ll pull for the conference? You bet. The Chick-fil-A Bowl was one of them. Loved it. Brilliant job, Les. I’m indifferent about Ole Miss in the Cotton Bowl, though I don’t give them much of a chance. It’s the opposite in the Sugar Bowl – I wouldn’t mind seeing Bama lose, but it’s not likely enough to worry about. Kentucky? Meh. Sure, why not?

I’m even a bit tired of Vanderbilt. Hooray, they won. In perfect Vandy fashion too. They pulled out the "bounce a punt off the other team" play from their South Carolina game and advanced the ball farther on penalty yardage than from actual football on their game-winning "drive". Opportunistic? Right. And the guy gets Coach of the Year for using a dartboard to pick his quarterback.

Of course all of this animosity doesn’t ignore the benefits of belonging to a good conference. As much as I want our rivals to lose and lose big, many of them will still win, and everyone will meet in a few months and divide up a pile of money that would qualify the SEC for G8 status.

Khalil El-Amin. Nice job, Fox.

(Screencap by the Dawgvent’s BopperDawg).

I imagine that most Georgia fans had some version of this internal (or, depending on company, external) discussion going on today.

“Now THAT is Georgia defense.”
“Where the heck was that in the other 12 games?”
“How many times are they going to have to bail us out?”
“Is this the result of a few people getting healthy, or did someone light a fire under this defense over the past month? “
“…or is it the result of playing a one-dimensional Big 10 offense?”
“If we join the Big 10 and give them a total of 12 teams, would the Big 12 mind?”

(Radi Nabulsi / UGASports.com)

It was a throwback to earlier in the decade or at least to September 13th and the game at South Carolina. Sloppy Bulldog offense leaned on the defense time after time until the offense could make a play. I’m sure the enjoyment of the win for some was tempered with the thought, “some of this in the second half on November 29th would have been nice.” The performance of the defense didn’t make up for whatever happened in the regular season and likely won’t make those losses any less painful, but most Georgia fans can let it go long enough to recognize a job well done.

Whatever you have to say about the game, it came down to this one series for me:

1st and Goal at GA 6: Javon Ringer rush for 3 yards to the Geo 3.
2nd and Goal at GA 3: Javon Ringer rush for no gain to the Geo 3.
3rd and Goal at GA 3: Brian Hoyer pass incomplete to Blair White.

How many times this year did we see the Georgia defense deflate after a turnover and/or a costly penalty? We had both here. A Stafford interception was returned to the 12, and a personal foul moved the ball to the Georgia 6. It was the third time that Michigan State had the ball on Georgia’s half of the field. The Dawgs kept Ringer out of the end zone, sniffed out the pass on 3rd down, and made MSU settle for the tying field goal.

You can say what you like about the quality of the opponent. As with Hawaii last year, watch how quickly a respectable ranked foe in a major bowl gets spun (even by our own fans) as a team barely worthy of a September cupcake game. But this hunkerdown-ness was something that was absent from even the Kentucky game. To see it show up time after time on Thursday against a decent team shouldn’t be discredited. Late or not, it was welcome.

We welcome Javon Ringer to the Ron Dayne Club. The standout tailback was held to 47 yards on 20 carries – a little short of a perfect afternoon. It’s not that Knowshon Moreno was that much more productive on the ground, but Georgia at least had a passing game on which to fall back. Ringer was the heart and soul of the MSU offense, and they got away from him. The Bulldog defense held Ringer to his second-lowest output of the season, and the result for the Spartans was much the same as it was the other two times this season in which Ringer ran for fewer than 21 carries.

MSU was one-dimensional, but when the defense was coming off a horrible effort against the ultimate in one-dimensional football, you can’t take it for granted that the strength of an offense would be shut down or that the weakness won’t burn you. MSU had their chances in the passing game, but the Bulldog defense made enough plays and got enough pressure to make it a non-issue.

One final note on the defense: Georgia had 18 sacks in 12 regular season games in 2008. They’ve had a combined 14 sacks in the past two bowl games. If someone could smuggle a calendar that reads “January 1” out to Stillwater in nine months, it would be most appreciated.

ESPN.com is reporting that former Tennessee defensive coordinator John Chavis is headed for Baton Rouge where he is expected to help shore up a defense that failed to perform following Bo Pelini’s departure a year ago.

Speaking of Tennessee defensive coordinators, when did Monte Kiffin start mailing it in down in Tampa? Over the last four games, the Tampa defense gave up 38 to Carolina, 41 to San Diego, and (worst of all) 31 in a home game against Oakland with a playoff spot at stake.

I’m sure a lot of hard work went into this AJC piece, but hopefully the conclusion that colleges and universities with major athletics programs lower their academic admissions standards across the board for student-athletes isn’t news to you. If it is, well….let’s just say you’re not going to like their follow-up series about Santa Claus.

Every time I see articles like this which go into great detail to show the different extent to which schools lower their admissions standards for student-athletes, I’m reminded of the quote often attributed to Shaw.

"We’ve already established what you are, ma’am. Now we’re just haggling over the price."

Saturday’s group of bowls were about as entertaining as a college football fan could want. The first quarter of the UNC-West Virginia game made the Oklahoma offense look unproductive. The individual performances by Hakeem Nicks and Pat White might not be topped over the rest of the bowl season, but ultimately the game was about Nick’s disappearance down the stretch and White’s precision passing on the winning score.

The nightcap was another game with solid individual performances and a close finish. Jacory Harris played well – if you could get past the broadcast crew’s gushing – but his spectacular blunder at the end made the difference. You also saw why Jahvid Best will get Heisman talk out of the gate next season. Did both the Cal and Miami coaches mismanage the quarterback position? Even if Harris wasn’t ready at the beginning of the season, it’s hard to imagine Miami getting better quarterback play in the bowl if a suspension hadn’t forced Randy Shannon’s hand. Further down the sideline, Tedford’s decision to play Longshore nearly cost them the game. It would have been hard to imagine Cal’s quarterback play being worse.

Even the FSU – Wisconsin game was interesting for a while. It’s tragically sad to see Wisconsin get all worked up because of the "speed versus power" cliche that gets slapped on a game like this and then go out and look slow and one-dimensional. Look, we know how Wisconsin plays ball. It’s been pretty successful for them, relatively speaking.

But putting this loss on Wisconsin’s (or the Big 10’s) style of play is lazy thinking. They played the same brand of ball in 2005 and 2006 when beating Arkansas and Auburn in bowls and also in 2004 and 2007 when they came up just short against Georgia and Tennessee. This is just a poor Wisconsin team, and I credit the ESPN studio crew for saying so. They had to scrape by Minnesota and Cal Poly, giving up over 30 points to each, just to become bowl-eligible.

FSU is now in competition with Notre Dame to see who can beat their chests more over winning a bowl game played nowhere near New Year’s Day.