Nick Chubb ran wild in Georgia's win over Auburn. (Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports)
It has been an interesting last few days in the Southeastern Conference and it started with Alabama knocking off Mississippi State, the No. 1 team in the nation. It continued with the Sunday announcement that Will Muschamp would not be back as coach of the Florida Gators next season.
It got even stranger when Florida’s best defensive player announced he was going to follow his coach out of Gainesville. Then the new College Football Playoff rankings came out with a new No. 1 team, which was no surprise. What was a surprise was that Alabama moved to No. 1, over undefeated Florida State, and that Mississippi State did not fall out of the top four.
The Florida situation was a long time coming. Muschamp’s tenure at Florida has been marked with injuries and losses that should have been wins — like Saturday’s loss to South Carolina in overtime. The Gators had to find a way to lose it and they did by having a field goal and a punt blocked in the final four minutes, turning a 17-10 seemingly sure victory into a loss.
“We didn’t win enough football games, that’s the bottom line. You’ve got to win games. We didn’t get that done,” said Muschamp on Sunday. “Very disappointed and frustrated that did not happen. Certainly had our opportunities, especially this year, keeping a healthy roster and having the opportunity to win football games, and we didn’t get it done. Certainly Saturday was a great example of that.”
The biggest question at Florida now is who will be the next man to stand in the spotlight that comes with being the Florida coach.
“We’ve got a deep and talented roster, so don’t let that new guy tell you he ain’t got no good players. Tell you that right now,” Muschamp said. “They got some good football players in that locker room. I feel like we’re headed the right direction at quarterback, as far as the depth and quality of the guys you got in the room, both lines of scrimmage, as talented a secondary as I’ve been around as far as those guys coming back, linebackers, you got some good players. Special place, special people and I don’t leave with any hard feelings or regrets at all.”
Muschamp might have any regrets, but he said he would do some things differently.
“There is no question. It’s frustrating to see guys stand in this day and say I wouldn’t have changed anything, well, hell you’d have gotten fired again,” he said. “The way I look at it, there are things that you go back and look back on your tenure, whether you’re a administrator, a coach, a CEO of a business, you would have maybe done some things differently when you look back but I always look at why you made the decision at the time and as long as you can look at the decision and say these were the parameters, it’s easy after it’s over with to say that wasn’t a very good decision.
“So sure there are things that you would do differently, there is no question about that, but I don’t think that’s attributed to being a first year coach, I don’t think that’s it, I think there are things that occur and happen and you’ve got to be able to manage those situations better/differently however they are but that’s for me, I handle it that way. I’m not going to make a public debate over that.”
Muschamp’s head coaching tenure, though stormy, could have been very different if he had waited just a couple of years before becoming a head coach.
He had the nebulous title of “Coach-in-Waiting” at Texas, but when the Florida situation came up he decided not to wait on Mack Brown to step down. If he had waited just two years Muschamp would have been the head coach of the Longhorns today instead of an out-of-work coach with a golden parachute of over $6 million.
If he thought the spotlight as the coach of the Gators was hot, he would have had a much brighter glare in Austin. On the plus side, though, he would be in an easier league with a greater chance of success.
The question that Gator fans are concerned with is who will be the next man to stand where Muschamp has been the past three years? Athletic director Jeremy Foley has already said he will be looking for an offensive-minded coach, which makes good sense with the reputation Florida has developed for having a good defense.
“I think you listen to the fans and certainly when Steve [Spurrier] was here and Urban [Meyer] was here, what fans say, we think that’s important. Going forward we will see what the pool looks like but we do think that’s important,” said Foley.
While Florida fans contemplate their next coach, Alabama fans are happy to be No. 1 in the College Football Playoff rankings, which is nice but doesn’t win you anything at this point. The move to No. 1 did not surprise the players who made it happen.
“To be the best, you have to beat the best,” said defensive back Cyrus Jones, who had an interception in the end zone against Mississippi State.
“Confusing the quarterback, showing different coverages, showing different techniques as we’re playing, just to get him confused so we could get him making bad decisions and bad throws like we did today,” safety Landon Collins said of MSU quarterback Dak Prescott.
Defense is the formula that Alabama used to get to No. 1 but there is still work left to be done. To stay in the top spot, the Crimson Tide has to be Western Carolina, Auburn and the SEC East champ in the title game.
Mississippi State is happy to still be ranked No. 4, but the Bulldogs will have to win out (Vanderbilt in Starkville and then Ole Miss in Oxford) to stay in the playoff mix. Unless somebody beats Alabama, the Bulldogs won’t have to play an SEC East division winner in the SEC Championship Game. It’s hard to say if that is an advantage or disadvantage until the playoff committee announces the final pairings the day after the championship games.
Mississippi State coach Dan Mullen knows how tenuous his hold is on the ranking.
“There is so much football still to be played this year,” Mullen said. “The playoff committee has their meetings all day Monday. I’m in my game planning meetings all day Monday. I’m more focused on beating Vanderbilt, and I’m sure they’re focused on trying to analyze 128 teams and how they rank those teams.”
