Bee-Cee-Ess Preview: Auburn, Destiny, And Taking From Your Neighbor's Plate

There are two stats that don't mean anything (or, actually, "less and less" is more accurate) in today's football- regardless of level...

Time of possession and yards allowed...

Hear me out...

In the days of power football, you wanted to keep the other guy off the field since he ran (literally) the same offense you did. If you kept the other guy's running game off the field, and you capitalized on your drives with points, the other guy simply didn't have the opportunity to score.

Today, I dare you to tell me how the streetball/basketball on grass/spread offenses really give a tinker's damn about time of possession. In the college game, we've seen Baylor, UCF, Clemson, Ohio State, Missouri, Oklahoma State, Northern Illinois, and any other pass happy-five wide outfit not care and cover the field from one end to the other in a few minutes.

Auburn's offense is the same way...

And it took the shortening of the playbook and familiarizing yourself with an athlete's talents that has put Auburn one game away from an improbable title- probably, the most shocking one of them all in the BCS era...

“It wasn’t something I was used to,” he told Ryan Black of the Macon Telegraph. “… In high school we ran the spread. But as I got here, they sat me down and taught me how the offense worked and (I) studied on film and watched what we do. It went from there and I got better as the weeks went.”

In that state title game for Wilcox County's Patriots, you could see Marshall had the arm to ad lib when he needed to and had the speed to make something out of less than nothing...
((HT: GPB/GHSA))


Auburn Undercover's Philip Marshall caught up with FOSG Wilcox County Head Coach Mark Ledford to talk about Nick's development and success...


But look deeper... and the invasion by Rodney Garner in taking Georgia talent away from his old boss has shone out...

The defensive front is young with Gabe Wright (Carver-Columbus), Carl Lawson (Milton), and Montravious Adams (Dooly County)...

CJ Uzomah (North Gwinnett) has finally found a home as a tall wide out that gives match-up problems on the outside...

And the upcoming recruiting classes include QB Tyler Queen (North Cobb) in 2015, and Kal Bessent a DB from Camden County, Myron Burton an ATH from Peachtree Ridge, Dontavious Russell a DT from Carrollton, and Stanton Truitt a QB from Monroe Area High who will be ATH'd in college...

And one of the largest flaws in Georgia's approach to winning in the Ess-E-Cee has given their neighbors their best shot of one of the best turnarounds in Division I history...

And that should be a big red flag to the folks in Athens...

Is ESPN Politicking for Alabama/Auburn Rematch?

If you venture over to the website of our friends at the 4-letter word (ESPN), you might see an interesting 1st page headline. (see right)

And while it's only a part of the content inside writer Gene Wojchiechowski's column on College Football's storylines this week, it raises some interesting questions.

The biggest is this: If you are NOT an SEC person, which few outside the Southeast are, does this sound like lobbying? Does it come across as portraying what would be best for ESPN?

To us, it kind of does...

But....if you actually READ Wojo's story, it's purely hypothetical based on the premise that Duke beats Florida State, Michigan State beats Ohio State and Auburn beats Missouri.

And while Duke is highly unlikely to beat Florida State, the other two scenarios could happen. Which means the headline is completely irrelevant. (note--we are fully aware of "hypothecial stories"---but remember, hypothetical does not equal real)

Read the full story from ESPN.com RIGHT HERE

Because by trade all of us here at OSG Sports are journalists, it's the headline that bothers us. While we and many others will certainly spend the time to actually read the story, not everyone will. And it will be taken the wrong way.

When the rest of the country sees Jay Jacobs on the Sunday SportsCenter saying: "To not have the SEC Champ in the BCS title game is...un-american and a dis-service to college football", aside from being laughably funny, is more or less an insult to everyone who is not an SEC fan or team.

The folks at ESPN have been and always will be willing to pander to whatever they believe will get more attention focused on themselves and create a debate where there should not be any.

It's what they are very good at.

That's why we wish they would have thought twice about making that particular subject their primary story of the day.