SEC report

Tide turn dominance to the Vols

Alabama head coach Nick Saban, right, shakes hands with former Tennessee and current NFL quarterback, Peyton Manning, before the first half of an NCAA college football game, Saturday, Oct. 23, 2015, in Tuscaloosa, Ala. (AP Photo/Butch Dill)

By Saturday night, the Arkansas Razorbacks may not be the only SEC team with an 11-game losing streak against Alabama.

The Crimson Tide have won 10 in a row against Tennessee, and they’re favored to make it 11 when the teams play Saturday at Bryant-Denny Stadium as Alabama is a 35½-point favorite.

Alabama is looking to match its longest winning streak against Tennessee. The Tide won 11 in a row from 1971-1981.

Alabama Coach Nick Saban, of course, is doing his best to convince everyone that Tennessee — the media included — will give the Tide a game.

“I think you all, like always, you’re always looking for all these assumptions because they have issues, they have problems some kind of way,” Saban said at his Monday news conference. “Why can’t that be a motivating factor for them and they play their best game of the year?

“Y’all ever think about that?”

Well, um, no.

Tennessee last beat Alabama 16-13 in 2006 — the season before Saban became the Tide’s coach — at Neyland Stadium. The Volunteers haven’t won at Alabama since 2003, when they needed five overtimes to prevail 51-43.

Arkansas and Tennessee are nowhere close to having the current longest losing streak to Alabama among SEC teams. Vanderbilt has lost 22 consecutive games to Alabama since beating the Tide 30-21 in 1984.

Collision course?

Mark Richt was fired as Georgia’s coach after the 2015 season — despite a 9-3 record that raised his overall mark to 145-51 in 15 years — and he remained so popular with the Bulldogs’ seniors that they invited him to attend the team’s banquet.

Richt already had been hired as Miami’s coach, but he took a weekend away from recruiting to help honor his former players.

“I’m 100 percent convinced that the University of Georgia and the University of Miami are on a collision course for a national championship,” Richt said at the banquet.

Maybe this season.

Georgia, now coached by former Alabama defensive coordinator Kirby Smart, is 7-0 and ranked No. 3 in both The Associated Press and USA Today polls.

Miami is 5-0 and ranked No. 8 in the AP poll and No. 7 in the USA Today poll.

The first College Football Playoff selection committee poll will be released Oct. 31, and if Georgia and Miami keep winning they figure to be high in that ranking.

Richt and Smart both praised each other’s team when asked about the Bulldogs and Hurricanes recently.

“I’m happy for Georgia,” Richt said on the ACC coaches teleconference last week. “I’m happy for all the kids I recruited, and I’m happy for all the guys I didn’t recruit.

“Georgia is a great place. It has a special place in the hearts of myself and my wife, and I’m all for them having a lot of success.”

Smart, an assistant coach for Richt at Georgia in 2005 when the Bulldogs last won the SEC championship, returned the praise this week when he met with reporters.

“I think Coach Richt has a rejuvenated energy and he’s done a good job,” Smart said. “They’re playing really hard and they’re recruiting well. He’s always done a tremendous job.”

Up in smoke

Missouri Coach Barry Odom literally burned up the Tigers’ 1-5 record through the first half of the season.

During a team meeting Sunday after Georgia beat Missouri 53-28, Odom set fire to items associated with the first six games, which a witness told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch included scouting reports, game plans, references to criticism on social media and a list of some SEC officials who missed calls.

For Odom it was a way to tell the players to forget what’s happened and focus on the season’s second half, when the schedule isn’t quite as tough starting with Saturday’s game against Idaho.

“They know what’s out there and what’s not out there,” Odom said at his weekly news conference. “It’s the elephant in the room. Let’s talk about it. So that’s good.

“They know what we’ve got this week. Let’s take care of business. There will be plenty of challenges next week, but also look at the big picture of what’s happened to this point and what we’ve got left.”

Odom said the Tigers won’t quit despite having a five-game losing streak since beating Missouri State to open the season.

“They’re going to compete, fight and prepare,” he said. “They know what we’ve got.

“They know what they’ve got in me. I know what I’ve got in them. It’s not where we wanted to be, but we’re going to get there.”

Florida Aggie

A Florida guy beat the Gators in The Swamp.

Texas A&M place-kicker Daniel LaCamera — whose parents Ann and Rick LaCamera are Florida graduates — hit a 32-yard field goal with 58 seconds left to lift the Aggies to a 19-17 victory at Florida on Saturday night.

LaCamera, who is from Tarpon Springs, Fla., said it was his first game-winning kick ever.

“It was great to do it back in my home state, too,” he said. “I had 16 tickets [for family and friends]. It was great to do it in front of them.”

LaCamera has hit 31 of 40 field goal attempts in his two seasons as the Aggies’ No. 1 kicker.

Oh brother

Kentucky Coach Mark Stoops is the family’s only major college head coach now that his older brother, Bob, has retired as Oklahoma’s coach.

The Wildcats are off to a 5-1 start in Stoops’ fifth season.

“Mark’s doing a great job,” Bob Stoops said recently after speaking at the Northwest Arkansas Touchdown Club. “They’re getting there.

“I think that’s an example to the fans of having some patience and allowing things to build. You know every year they seem to little by little keep getting better and better personnel and having a stronger and stronger team.”

Bad idea

When Auburn jumped out to a 17-0 lead in the first quarter at LSU last week, Auburn’s mascot decided to have some fun at the home team’s expense.

Aubie changed out of his Tigers outfit and dressed up as a Troy Trojan to remind LSU fans their team lost to Troy 24-21 earlier this season.

But it turned out, the joke was on Aubie and his team. LSU rallied to beat Auburn 27-23.

Back to Oxford

LSU’s game at Ole Miss on Saturday will be the first time Tigers Coach Ed Orgeron will be working as a head coach in Vaught-Hemingway Stadium since his three-year stint leading the Rebels from 2005-2007.

Orgeron was fired at Ole Miss after his teams went 10-25, including 3-21 in SEC games.

“I had a tremendous opportunity at Ole Miss,” Orgeron told reporters this week. “I didn’t get it done, but the past is the past.

“This is way behind us. Me and my family have moved forward. I’m so happy to be an LSU Tiger.”

Orgeron said LSU-Ole Miss is a big game, but not because of him.

“It means a lot, and it has nothing to do with me,” he said. “This is about the team. This game is not about me.”

100 for Saban

Alabama’s 41-9 victory over Arkansas improved Tide Coach Nick Saban to 100-24 in SEC games as the coach of LSU and Alabama.

Saban is one of five coaches with 100 SEC victories along with Fordyce native Bear Bryant (159-16-9 at Alabama and Kentucky), Steve Spurrier (126-52 at Florida and South Carolina), Johnny Vaught (106-41-10 at Ole Miss) and Vince Dooley (105-41-4 at Georgia).

Two-minute drill

LSU’s 27-23 victory over Auburn after trailing by 20 points was the Tigers’ largest comeback since 1977 when they beat Ole Miss 28-21 after being down 21.

Florida Coach Jim McElwain was 9-1 in one-score games before the Gators lost to LSU 17-16 and Texas A&M 19-17 the past two weeks.

Kentucky is looking to win at Mississippi State for the first time since 2008.

Missouri wide receiver Emanuel Hall caught two 63-yard touchdown passes from Drew Lock against Georgia.

Ole Miss interim Coach Matt Luke was an assistant coach for Ed Orgeron with the Rebels.

LSU has won 11 consecutive games in October. The Tigers’ last loss in the month to Auburn was 41-7 on Oct. 5, 2014.

Alabama has won 71 consecutive games against unranked teams since losing to Auburn 17-10 in 2007.

Player to watch

Devin White

LB, LSU

LSU sophomore linebacker Devin White has been named SEC Defensive Player of the Week for his performance in consecutive games after he had 13 tackles at Florida and a career-high 15 against Auburn. White, 6-1 and 248 pounds, signed with LSU as a running back and was an early enrollee in January 2016, but he was moved to linebacker in spring practice and has excelled on defense. White helped LSU hold Auburn to 64 yards in the second half as LSU rallied from a 20-point deficit to win 27-23. White’s 77 tackles lead the SEC and rank third nationally. He has three sacks for 12 yards in losses.

SEC statistics: Week 7 Game of the week

Kentucky at Mississippi State 3 p.m. Saturday, SEC Network

It might seem odd for this game to be the pick for the conference’s top matchup, but on a Saturday where five SEC teams are off, Mississippi State (5-1, 2-1 SEC) taking on Kentucky (4-2, 1-2) will have to do. At least both teams have a winning record. CBS is showing the Alabama-Tennessee game, but that figures to be the latest lopsided victory for the Crimson Tide. The only reason CBS picked that game is because Alabama is ranked No. 1 and will draw viewers, not because Tennessee is expected to make it remotely close. Kentucky and Mississippi State should at least be a competitive, entertaining game. The Bulldogs are 11 1/2-point favorites.

Saturday’s other games

Idaho at Missouri

WHEN 11 a.m. RECORDS Idaho 2-4; Missouri 1-5 TV SEC Network LINE Missouri by 14

Tennessee at No. 1 Alabama

WHEN 2:30 p.m. RECORDS Tennessee 3-3, 0-3 SEC; Alabama 7-0, 4-0 TV CBS LINE Alabama 35 1/2

No. 24 LSU at Ole Miss

WHEN 6:15 p.m. RECORDS LSU 5-2, 2-1 SEC; Ole Miss 3-3, 1-2 TV ESPN LINE LSU by 6 1/2

No. 21 Auburn at Arkansas

WHEN 6:15 p.m. RECORDS Auburn 5-2, 3-1 SEC; Arkansas 2-4, 0-3 TV SEC Network LINE Auburn by 15 1/2

By the numbers

51 Percentage for Georgia on third-down conversions. The Bulldogs have gotten first downs on 52 of 102 third-down plays.

9.2 Yards per carry for Alabama running back Damien Harris. He’s rushed for 625 yards on just 68 carries, including a 75-yard touchdown against Arkansas last week.

“Overheard”

“I really do respect and appreciate every one of you. Do I agree with you? Not always.”

— Alabama Coach Nick Saban to reporters at his weekly news conference

“Gut check.”

— LSU Coach Ed Orgeron on his team rallying from 20 points down to beat Auburn

“I thought we did all the things it takes to play winning football except one element … and that’s score touchdowns in the red zone. We had to kick field goals.”

— Tennessee Coach Butch Jones on the Volunteers’ 15-9 loss to South Carolina

SEC top to bottom

RK. (PV) TEAM REC. COMMENT

  1. (1) Alabama 7-0 Ready to put another pounding on Vols

  2. (2) Georgia 7-0 Open date to get ready for Florida

  3. (4) Texas A&M 5-2 Sumlin needs strong finish

  4. (5) LSU 5-2 Orgeron going back to Ole Miss

  5. (3) Auburn 5-2 Can’t hold 20-point lead at LSU

  6. (7) Kentucky 5-1 It’s not basketball season yet

  7. (8) So.Carolina 5-2 Open date to enjoy W at Tennessee

  8. (9) Miss. State 4-2 No problem beating BYU

  9. (6) Florida 3-3 Back-to-back losses in Swamp by 3 points

  10. (12) Ole Miss 3-3 Patterson throws for 351 against Vandy

  11. (11) Tennessee 3-3 10 quarters without a touchdown

  12. (10) Vanderbilt 3-4 Four consecutive losses since beating K-State

  13. (13) Arkansas 2-4 Hoping for better second half of season

  14. (14) Missouri 1-5 Taking on Paul Petrino’s Idaho team

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