Random Musings From the SEC Championship Game

Vlachos had an amazing game. I know the whole line did, but he seemed to always make it out in front of a linebacker, usually Spikes, and take him completely out of the game.

Also, good call on Florida’s offense. I have watched the game again, and while Alabama did get some key stops and made some nice plays in the redzone especially. This game was completely about Alabama’s offense. Alabama controlled the ball for nearly 2/3 of the game.

…than on that play. We talked about how fearsome that damn shovel/option is on the Radio Hour before the game and I’m not the least bit surprised they chose to open with it.

I agree a better throw would have made it a TD, but IMHO the throw wasn’t the main problem, it was the read. When I re-watched that play, I noticed that Arenas had short coverage against the slot receiver (not sure who) and passed him off just as Tebow started his throw to cover the corner route. He was not just standing there when the ball was thrown, but he jumped in front of the ball just as Tebow was releasing it. I think it was more of a great play by Arenas than a terrible one by Tebow.

I think he takes a lot of heat for poor play when generally, in the games he didn’t play well, the issue was poor protection from the offensive line. Our offensive line completely dominated Florida. That was not the case against Ole Miss, South Carolina and Tennessee. Pressured quarterbacks make hasty throws and bad decisions. I’d still take a hasty, sloppy McElroy over John Parker Wilson any day. At least McElroy’s poor play didn’t lead to multiple interceptions, fumbles, and points for the other team.

Four plays showed Bama players making that extra effort:

McElroy’s tiptoe for first down.
McElroy’s block to spring Richardon for extra yardage
PJ Fitzgerald’s open field tackle.
McLain outrunning Gator blockers to stop Demps on a sweep.

All four of these plays should have been “negative” plays for Bama, but on each one, the player gutted it out to do what was necessary to turn a negative into a positive.

I have been a fan of McElroy’s all season. I like the fact that Saban sticks with him, and let’s him grow into the position. I think he is the smartest and coolest quaterback since Hollingsworth. And he will do what it takes to win.

Not a lot of talk about him in this game, but he got beat multiple times. Once was on bump and run against Cooper. The play ended up going for a big 1st down. He took a bad angle on a screen play and was beat in the 3rd quarter by Nelson ( i think). Im not saying he played terrible, but it def wasn’t his best game.

Automatically, the 2005 Florida game (Croyle), 2007 UT (Wilson) and 2001 Auburn (Zow) come to my mind in terms of an Alabama QB just having an unreal day. But yeah, McElroy’s performance was the best in my mind certainly taking the stakes into account.

was the offensive performance. Our defense played pretty good, great at times, but we won the game on offense. No one was going to shut FL’s offense down, but our offense kept their offense off the field and moved the ball and scored points. I thought all along the key match-up was our offense vs their defense and we dominated that aspect of the game. If we play close to that we will defeat Texas as well.

Florida ran their combo option / shovel pass play on the opening play of the game, and Eryk Anders chased down Hernandez from the backside to make the tackle for a minimal gain. Anders followed Hernandez the entire way and we were obviously prepared for such a play, but the interesting thing of it was that Florida never went back to that play the rest of the game. That really surprised me, especially given how successful that play has been for them the past couple of years.

A couple of us noticed, before this game, that Hernandez tips this particular play to the defense (similar to the way Alex Brown picked up the hitch in Tee Martin’s cadence prior to the 1999 Florida/Tennessee game) with his pre-snap stance/behavior. We got in contact with Jeremy Pruitt, who was a GA at Alabama when we were there and who is currently on Saban’s staff, and relayed our findings to him. He simply said, “Don’t worry, we’re looking at everything. We’re all over it.”

I think Ander’s reaction on the first play showed Florida that we would not give them this play so they abandoned it.

Vlachos had one hell of a game. Almost every running play he was knocking the shit out of Spikes. He was dominating. The whole offensive line had a great game.