Another strange week in college football with some very good teams going down. Munson remarked that Georgia’s fans probably couldn’t believe what they were seeing at
Auburn. The weekend summary included
Arkansas – with that guy who runs like a jackrabbit – rolling over
Tennessee ... Tech’s defense saved them vs. North Carolina ... Cal slipped, losing to Arizona … USC did what it had to do to stay near the top in the polls. Also, Stanford winning its first game (over Washington) was included.
Georgia finally gets this coming weekend off, and then comes Tech.
Watching that opening drive, six minutes and the length of the field, had to be great for the team’s confidence. CMR – it was a great start to the game. Every receiver who got his hands on the ball caught it.
Jeremy in Memphis agreed its amazing what happens when guys catch the ball. He also talked a lot (80 sec.) about redshirting on the lines, then about the new clock rules (focusing on Wisconsin’s stunt a couple of weeks ago). CMR agrees that redshirting is a good thing when possible. CMR also remarked that he’s never been asked by a pro scout to see a guy’s freshman tape.
As for the clock rule – CMR thinks it’s a disaster. Tuberville was on the rules committee. Sometimes change has to be made whether we like it or not. Tubs said he felt like it was a mandate from people to do it. We had 66 plays Saturday but Auburn had only 37. That’s like half of a game. We took advantage of that clock. CMR still believes it’s a bad rule.
Steven in Dalton commented on the good opening game for next year and wondered about moving Appalachian St. to 2013 to make room for the trip to Oklahoma St. for 2009. CMR doesn’t know if getting OSU is good or bad. They scored 66 points last week and also beat Nebraska this year. He was not aware of the Appalachian St. change.
Joe T ought to get into this last game, his last game Between the Hedges. Every senior will be a captain for this game.
Trey in Waycross (young kid) wondered if we might get Thomas Brown for the Tech game. CMR explained that Brown’s injury takes a while to get better so he’ll be back next year.
David in Grayson noticed the passing game was really clicking with rolling out. Was this by design? And will Munson have new shoes before the Tech game? Munson remarked he got a new pair of Nike shoes on the bus heading from Columbus to Auburn and we won. So now he has a decision to make.
CMR – bottom line was we protected, Matthew put it on the money and our guys caught it. Its not rocket science. WRs have to understand if it is man coverage you have to get off a jam and get open. Most of the time Stafford had to run on passing plays was more due to coverage. It was just one of those games where everything seemed to go well. One key was we hit a couple of deep balls. When you hit deep balls it breaks down what a defense might want to do. Sometimes fans just want to run the ball all the time but remember what happened to Auburn three years ago…
Eddie in Acworth talked about being able to wear his Georgia stuff with pride. What about our RBs? CMR – Lump hurt his ankle just a little bit. He may not practice this week – not that we’ll practice much this week anyway. Ware hurt his knee slightly and his ankle a little more. There’s no guarantee he’ll be able to play in the Tech game. Jason Johnson would be available. We’d have to make sure Southerland knows what to do on tailback plays.
Paul in Centre, AL called in last week and was down on Stafford. He admitted that CMR was right. Paul lives in the middle of Bama/Auburn area and has been abused for two months. It was great going to work today (and for his son to go to school). Why did we take a knee on the 8 with 3 minutes left? CMR’s number one goal is to win, not to humiliate anyone for next time. We don’t want to do anything to cause something crazy to happen. The safest thing to do to run the clock .. it would literally be impossible for them to score three times.
Carl in Canton (cell phone) wondered if CMR saw it coming with Stafford. CMR said he’d seen it coming since spring, and certainly fall practice. When you see him every day in practice, you see things that fans don’t see. In the other games, he threw INTs, but there were 50-60 other plays you’d see good things on. Those interceptions override the good things. But that’s what rookies do. Every guy CMR has coached has made mistakes but usually its on the practice field as a redshirt.
Mark in Newburn wondered what CMR did differently this week. Also, we should have plenty of bulletin board material for the nats
Only thing CMR did differently was practicing inside on Tuesday, instead of hitting as is usual. It was just a matter of everyone hanging in there and holding together. Not just on the field, but off the field with people wondering and doubting. We kept grinding and working hard, and something good happened. We got a spark, then caught fire.
Josey in Tampa sees CMR as a teacher as much as a coach. In this season where things have gone wrong, taking a knee at the end taught a lesson in dealing with success. What about Milner and Lump? CMR agrees with Josey about learning life lessons. All those kids on our team had done nothing but win 10 games and play for championships. The whole key to beating Auburn was that everyone stayed together. We were struggling and didn’t know how to act sometimes, but we stayed together. We were able to mount a game like we did. If we had fallen apart, there’s no way we would have had a game like that. Sometimes you just need to stay the course, persevere and be patient. Milner made some big catches and Lump had over 100 yards plus a TD catch on a screen pass. He did have the one fumble but was trying to eek it out for another first down. Lump was a captain for this game and did enough to warrant being a captain for the next game, except that Richt has a tradition of having all the seniors be captains for the last home game and Lump doesn’t make that cut since he’s a junior.
Keith in North Carolina wants Richt to compare Stafford to Ward or Chris Weinke. Stafford is kind of a combination of both. He’s not quite as agile as Ward but moves well. Weinke had a great arm but wasn’t very mobile Stafford has a nice combination of both. He has to continue to learn to make great decisions. That will be the key to how good he becomes.
CMR thinks there are lots of redshirt freshmen who could be big contributors next year – two safeties, 3 LBs, several defensive linemen, Moreno (TB), Tony Wilson. We have a bunch of guys who will have a chance to do great things for us. Josh Davis (OT) has really grown into a man, and Chris Davis and Kevin Perez are really coming along well.
Munson mentioned the DL and CMR mentioned Ray Gant in particular, who really had a good game. Owens, Weston and Dixson also had strong games as well. The defense held them to only 170 yards on 37 plays.
Sandy in Lilburn was really impressed with Southerland. CMR mentioned a play where we had Southerland opened on a pass route that had come open but we couldn’t protect long enough on it.
Louis in Hawkinsville wanted to remind everyone that Tra Battle was one of the top Pontiac performers on ESPN and everyone needs to vote for him. CMR agrees and said he’d try to figure out how to vote himself.
Michael in Macon said this win was one everyone really needed. CMR agreed. To have a victory like that after everything had been going wrong was a great tribute to the guys. They just felt like keeping on keeping on.
Rick in Hoschton wasn’t surprised the guys were ready. He focused on their OL and noticed they couldn’t do anything with our defense. Rick has also noticed students running onto the field after these last two Big East Thursday games and the Texas-Kansas St. game. CMR agreed with Rick about our OL and DL dominating games.
CMR thinks storming the field can be dangerous but appreciates the enthusiasm. The safest thing is that fans stay in the stands and let the players come to them. Richt was really thrilled with the support from our students and especially the band. The team could hear our band all the way from pregame warm-ups on.
When the buses were rolling out, CMR noticed about 100 Auburn fans left, who just stood there and tipped their hats. He’d never seen that except at Nebraska when FSU won there. Not only those Auburn fans, but Auburn’s players and coaches offered heartfelt congratulations after the game. Richt wanted to compliment them on it.
Terry in Macon said Saturday goes to show what happens when linemen block, receivers catch and someone lights a fire under Ray Gant. CMR laughed and said it was a great win for the team.
Munson and CMR plan to spend more time next week talking about Tech.
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