SEC Coaches Rankings: Week Five (NorthFultonTimes)

SEC Coaches Rankings: Week Five

By Jay Holgate
SEC Sports Report

Published Oct 3, 2007

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Welcome to the SEC Coaches Stock Market Report, Week Five. We look at SEC coaches and the impact they have on their teams like a Wall Street analyst watches stocks. We are gauging multiple factors to evaluate their performance. We are not privy to their practices or insider information; therefore we base our opinions on what we read about each team. Our goal is to let you know who is up and who is down in the SEC.

This week, SEC winners outpaced losers 7-4. We have a number of adjustments going into this week. Our two highest performing stocks for the season, those of Les Miles and Urban Meyer; one has a small adjustment. We have a new stock, which is Auburn. Auburn which has been under performing but seems to have made some market adjustments. Spurrier has returned to top tier and Mark Richt is making his team better every week.

Just so everybody understands the rules of the game; Our analysis is a big picture evaluation which includes a lot of factors. We are not evaluating how well a coach calls a game, unless he completely blows it with the potential of losing the confidence of his team. In our opinion, the SEC has twelve of the best coaches in the nation.

The confidence factor is our confidence in the program going forward; Five ***** being the highest rating. If you want to play at home, send us your rankings. Until then, enjoy. It is a volatile market. The stars indicate how we are feeling about a particular coach and this years team , but what really matters is the rank order of the coaches week to week.

1) This weeks SEC Coach of the Week is Tommy Tuberville of Auburn. Auburn upset Florida this week in the Swamp 20-17. A big upset always moves a coach to the top of our list. Coach Tuberville plays with so much courage that it’s inspirational to his team. In the second quarter, Auburn could have gone for a safe field goal when they were stopped inside the ten. Not Tuberville, he knows you cannot beat Florida by kicking field goals. Auburn proceeded to score the touchdown. Auburn’s defense looked strong and made us improve their confidence rating to a 3.5***. It’s good to have Auburn back. This week they play Vandy at home carried by Lincoln Financial.

2) Les Miles got his team to a #1 rating in the country. LSU beat Southern Cal by 1 vote to move to the #1 spot. LSU beat Tulane 34-9 in a weekend in which a lot of top ten schools were upset. This week, LSU is favored by nine points against the Florida Gators. The game will be in Baton Rouge and it will be the ESPN Game Day location. This 8:30 pm ET game will be covered by CBS. LSU is our only 5***** rated team after 5 weeks.

3) Whenever you are dealing with Steve Spurrier, you know he will not be down long. Last week, we had him in the bottom spot for the SEC Coaches. This week, Spurrier’s Gamecocks played strong against an up and coming Miss State team. Spurrier went with a Freshman quarterback in Chris Smelley, and his defense shut down the run in the second half. This week, the Gamecocks face #8 Kentucky in Columbia for the ESPN Thursday night game. The Gamecocks have the #1 pass defense in the country and they will need it against Andre Woodson who is a Heisman candidate with a great arm. We are keeping this team at a 4**** rating.

4) Who let the Dawgs out in the 4^th quarter? The Bulldogs played toe to toe with Ole Miss until the fourth quarter, when Georgia broke loose. Senior running back Thomas Brown had 180 yards on 16 carries which is his career high. The Bulldogs defense is causing turnovers and the team is taking advantage of it. This week the Bulldogs travel to Knoxville to play the Tennessee Volunteers. Should be a great game. We like how this Bulldog team is getting better each week. We will keep this team at a 4**** confidence rating.

5) Houston Nutt has not had much to smile about this year. But on Saturday his team scored 66 points to beat North Texas 66-7. The Razorbacks generated 713 yards on offense and scored on seven of their first nine possessions. The Razorbacks needed a game like this to re-build their confidence. This week Arkansas hosts Chattanooga in Little Rock. This game should be another confidence builder for the Hogs. We will keep Arkansas at a 4**** confidence rating.

6) We had to move Kentucky off the top spot even though Rich Brooks and his team occupied the #1 spot for two weeks in a row. Kentucky rolled over Florida Atlantic last week 45-17. Andre Woodson continues to shine as he threw 26 for 33 for 301 yards. Woodson lost his consecutive pass record as he threw an interception in this game. This week, Kentucky travels to Columbia to face Steve Spurrier who has never lost a game to Kentucky in his career. This should be a great Thursday night ESPN game. We love the Kentucky spirit and will keep this team at a 4**** confidence rating. The winner of this game could get upgraded.

7) Bobby Johnson has set a new record at Vanderbilt. The three wins in September mark the quickest time period Vandy has ever won three games. Vandy smoked Eastern Michigan 30-7. This week Vandy travels to Auburn in a tough SEC game. We believe this will be a good game. Vandy could sneak up on an Auburn team that has not played well at home. We will keep this team at a 3*** confidence rating.

8) This week Tennessee had a bye. We always use the bye team to divide the SEC winners for the week from the losers. Tennessee needed a bye week as much as anybody so they could prepare for a tough Georgia Bulldog team at home. Tennessee should be able to continue throwing the ball but must play a better defensive game to stop this confident Georgia Bulldog team. The game will be covered on CBS. We will keep Tennessee at a 3.5 *** confidence rating but we will watch this game closely. Both teams are in a must-win situation. The loser could be done for the SEC East title.

9) Sylvester Croom had three straight wins going. Then, he had to play Steve Spurrier. It seems like every time they play, Miss State loses a starting quarterback. Miss State has a solid defense and they played the Gamecocks close until late third quarter. This week, MSU plays UAB (1-3) and there is no TV coverage. We will keep MSU at a 3.5 *** confidence rating and believe they will win this week.

10) Ed Orgeron is going to get the horseshoes stock award. Ole Miss gets close but cannot seem to win. This team has figured out how to play three quarters of good competitive football. Unfortunately, the fourth quarter is where the winners have been living. This week the Rebels have a home game against Louisiana Tech and should give the Rebels a win. We will keep this team at a 2** rating and watch them pick up another out of conference victory this weekend.

11) Nick Saban was our early star. We liked the way his team came back on Arkansas. We thought they could beat a more talented Florida State team. We were wrong. Saban did a good job of keeping it close; however Florida State wanted it more. This week Alabama hosts Houston (2-2) and it should be a good non-conference game. Pay per view. We are going keep this team at a 4**** confidence rating; but they are on the watch list because they did not play great ball.

12) Urban Meyer has never seen the bottom of our SEC Coaches rankings, until now. Florida was exposed last week when they let Ole Miss hang in there until the end. Urban Meyer probably had a hard time getting his team up when Florida was favored by 18 points. Auburn wanted this game more than Florida. Now with all the pressure of the LSU game, Florida is having some internal problems. Senior captain Tony Joiner was arrested for trying to steal his girlfriends car out of an impound lot. Three Florida players were questioned after a shooting outside of a nightclub; they are not suspects. Running back Chris Rainey and offensive tackle Phil Trautwein are both lost for the season with injuries. This week, the Gators travel to LSU and are nine point underdogs to the #1 team in the nation. We are downgrading Florida to a 4.5**** confidence rating because they have been exposed and it is a tough road ahead.

Jay Holgate is an analyst with SECSportsReport.com