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College Football

The Throwback: Florida-LSU will happen … I think

Corey Long

By Corey Long

Published:

* SEC Champion by percentage-point technicality.

FLORIDA-LSU NEEDS TO HAPPEN

Even though it was 81 degrees and sunny in Gainesville on Saturday at noon, I understand why the LSU-Florida game wasn’t played at that time. There were a lot of things going on around the state. I live in Florida (St. Petersburg) and it was relatively quiet in my part of the state, but my parents live in West Palm Beach, and believe me, I was very worried about them Thursday night.

Hurricane Matthew left a trail of problems from the East coast of Florida up to Georgia and the Carolinas. These problems will take a while to clean up. Before the storm hit the states, it absolutely destroyed Haiti. Forget what some conspiracy wonks tell you, Matthew was the real deal. My heart legitimately goes out to those affected.

Now on to the LSU-Florida mess. Florida’s outgoing AD Jeremy Foley took a lot of heat, and there’s a lot of conspiracy wonks out there because it’s clear that Florida’s chances to win the SEC East are greater without playing LSU and risking a second conference loss against a tough SEC West team.

Were Foley’s concerns for Matthew genuine? Sure.

Was Foley being completely honest in his press conference? Ehhh.

He has 25 years of experience as the athletic director at Florida and has contingency plans for pretty much everything. In 2004, he had to deal with more direct hits from Hurricane Jeanne and Hurricane Frances, both happened in September.

Bottom line: He’s been here before. He knew his options, and he knew what the alternatives were.

I don’t believe that “Florida is scared” or any of that silliness. I doubt the Gator players are afraid of facing an LSU offense led by Danny Etling. They commit to Florida to play these types of games, so let’s be serious.

Of course critics will point out the following:

* Florida never played a regular-season, non-conference game outside of the state during Foley’s 24-year tenure.

* Foley canceled the series against Miami, who is in the state, for 1992-93 and 1996-97 claiming financial concerns. Those games were replaced by Louisville, Arkansas State, Southwestern Louisiana and Central Michigan.

So critics that say Foley is never one to avoid the easiest way out of a challenge have some ammunition.

But to say the players are scared? Nah, I’m not going there. The players want to play.

SANKEY IS NO SLIVE

Former SEC Commissioner Mike Slive didn’t always make people happy, but he got things done much like his predecessor Roy Kramer.

He wouldn’t have let Foley or LSU AD Joe Alleva make this decision. He would have put it in his hands. Maybe he would have pushed it back to Sunday. Maybe he would have moved the game to Birmingham or another neutral site. But it would have gotten done. He would have made sure of that.

For Slive, it was always about perception. If the SEC is perceived as the biggest, baddest conference out there, they will play the games. They will use all the resources available to make things happen. If nature forces a change of course, so be it, but the course will be changed.

The idea that one team could win a division without playing the necessary conference games would be laughable to Slive.

Greg Sankey is no Mike Slive. He needed to nip this in the bud quickly. Instead, he expected Foley and Alleva to figure something out and neither man wanted to budge in a negotiation.

Sankey spent the rest of the weekend doing damage control. He let Gary Danielson grill him during halftime of the Tennessee-A&M game and appeared on ESPN during halftime of Alabama-Arkansas.

His message on both networks was that his desire is to see the game played. He continued that message Sunday and got stronger in his desire to see the game played.

Now he’s going to have to put those words into action.

FOR THOSE WHO PLAYED

* Another week, another amazing game involved Tennessee. However, this time they failed to come out with a victory. The Volunteers, already ravaged with injuries, had to deal with a scary one from defensive tackle Danny O’Brien, who was carted off the field. Luckily, the later reports were that he was moving all his extremities and flew home with the team.

* Texas A&M’s first win over a top 10 opponent shows the Aggies are for real. Although the defense has blown a couple of double-digit, fourth-quarter leads, the Aggies are still undefeated and staring at a potential top-five showdown against Alabama in two weeks. Trevor Knight continues to kill it on the ground with three rushing touchdowns, including the game-winner in overtime. He was named the Walter Camp offensive player of the week.

* Nick Chubb had to wait until Sunday to show that he was getting back to full health, but he’s looking good again.

* Minkah Fitzpatrick grabbed three interceptions and returned one 100 yards for a TD to lead Alabama past Arkansas. He was named Walter Camp defensive player of the week.

* Auburn quietly cooled off Gus Malzahn’s hot seat after a big 38-14 road win at Mississippi State. The Tigers have won three in a row going into their bye week and are facing key October matchups against Arkansas and Ole Miss to keep their SEC West hopes alive.

* Kentucky has won three of four and worked its way back to .500 after a 20-13 win over Vanderbilt. The Wildcats have to pull off a couple of upsets to get to a bowl, but things are looking a lot better for Mark Stoops than they were three weeks ago.

* South Carolina, a 28-14 loser to Georgia, has scored 84 points through six games this season. That’s 127th in the nation. Only Buffalo has scored fewer with 76.

* With A&M’s 45-38 double-overtime victory over Tennessee this weekend, the SEC West improves to 6-0 over the SEC East.

Corey Long

Corey Long is a freelance writer for SaturdayDownSouth.com. Follow Corey on Twitter @CoreyLong.

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