One month down, two to go.

Don’t consider that my way of counting down until the end of the season. Consider it my way of saying that we’re a third of the way through the 2018 season. Crazy how time works, I know.

What that means is that we now have a month worth of information to jump to conclusions from. I mean “learn” from.

Here’s what I learned from each SEC team in Week 5:

Alabama — My Jalen Hurts take was officially wrong

I had been saying since preseason that Hurts was going to quit the team and preserve his year of eligibility. One quarterback on a national contender team did that, but it wasn’t Hurts. Kelly Bryant did what I thought Hurts would do. Instead, we learned that Hurts is indeed on board for all of 2018 after appearing in his fifth game. And here’s a crazy thought — Hurts is actually getting much better as a passer:

  • 2017 — 60.4, percent, 8.2 yards per attempt, 15 passes every TD
  • 2018 — 70.3 percent, 10.6 yards per attempt, 7.4 passes every TD

Not bad, backup.

Arkansas — The Arkansas defense is making serious progress

I sort of chalked up that defensive performance against Auburn to an offense that was struggling to find an identity. After what Arkansas did against Texas A&M to keep that a game at Jerry World, I stand corrected. John Chavis has that unit playing with speed that we didn’t see against North Texas or Colorado State. Dre Greenlaw and the defense made life difficult on Kellen Mond, which bodes well for how Arkansas will fair against mobile SEC quarterbacks. Next up? Tua Tagovailoa.

Auburn — The running game issues are significant

So this is noteworthy.

Even in a weird game with a long rain delay, that shouldn’t happen at home against Southern Miss. The inexperience up front is hurting the Tigers, as is that they don’t look like they have a bonafide NFL tailback. Add that to the fact that Jarrett Stidham was and is a pass-first quarterback and it’s no wonder why Auburn is second to last in the SEC with just 4.2 yards per carry.

Florida — The Gators have more toughness than I thought

No, I wasn’t sold on a team that essentially had one Power 5 win in the last year entering Saturday. But that was a gritty performance that I didn’t think the Gators had in them. Defensively, Florida just looks vastly superior with Cece Jefferson and David Reese on the field. Offensively, that was the most impressed I’ve ever been with Feleipe Franks. I don’t care what his final line was. He was decisive, accurate and he didn’t make the back-breaking mistake that MSU needed. Dan Mullen has a lot of be proud of.

Georgia — The ground game is the biggest noticeable difference from last year’s squad

Up until the last few minutes, Georgia was sitting there with 3.5 yards per carry. Against Tennessee. At home. Color me surprised. Part of that could have been the game of musical chairs on the offensive line. It seemed like the Dawgs just couldn’t find the right personnel grouping everywhere. Justin Fields even got some non-blowout, non-red zone snaps to try and spark the ground game. Still, the chunk plays we’ve grown so accustomed to seeing aren’t there yet, at least not against SEC teams. Vandy should be a get-right game for the offense.

Kentucky — The Cats can handle the spotlight

I was curious how the Cats would respond after being the media darling for a full week. How did Kentucky come out? Like it expected to be there. The Cats got 3 rushing touchdowns from 3 players in the second quarter alone. Kentucky didn’t look like a team that was feeling itself too much. It still got after the quarterback, won the turnover battle and ran the ball with Benny Snell. The Cats will have plenty of eyes on them as long as they continue this historic start.

LSU — Joe Burrow is ready

Yes, there should be an asterisk on offensive numbers against Ole Miss. The Rebels are far from the creme of the crop defensively. Still, though. Burrow accounted for nearly 400 yards of offense in a blowout win.

On the season, Burrow is now at 5-0 with a 6-0 touchdown-interception ratio. He’ll have quite the test against Florida in The Swamp, but based on the fearlessness that we’ve seen Burrow play with already, it’s hard to envision him being overwhelmed on the road against a quality defense.

Mississippi State — “Offensive work in progress” was putting it lightly

One touchdown in 8 quarters vs. SEC competition is, um, putrid. I knew that there would be learning curve for Nick Fitzgerald in this offense in the first year of the Joe Moorhead era. I didn’t expect it to be this steep. The receivers haven’t helped out Fitzgerald very much, but we saw how much he’s struggling to process this offense against better defenses. Nothing illustrated that better than when Fitzgerald let an unblocked safety demolish him on the final play via a blitz right up the gut. I still like the chances of the offense figuring it out long-term, but I wouldn’t feel great about that happening against Auburn this weekend.

Mizzou — The road to second in the East looks tougher than ever

A bye week after Georgia probably gave the Tigers a chance to look around the East and see what Florida and Kentucky did. The Wildcats are easily the second-best team in the East right now, and Florida is going to be a problem, too. I’m sure plenty of people had that Mizzou-South Carolina game penciled in as a possible second-place battle. It definitely doesn’t look like that anymore.

Ole Miss — There are major issues against mobile quarterbacks

The Rebels nearly allowed 100 rushing yards to Joe Burrow. That’s not a knock against the mobile LSU quarterback, but that shouldn’t happen. Since that solid defensive showing against Texas Tech, the Rebels have allowed an average of 63 rushing yards to opposing quarterbacks. What’s the good news? Ole Miss won’t face another true dual-threat quarterback until November. But based on what we’ve seen from the Rebels, they might make a few signal-callers look like dual-threat quarterbacks.

South Carolina — Offensive mediocrity appears imminent

That was, um, uninspiring. Credit Kentucky’s defense, which looks like one of the nation’s better units right now. But yeesh, just 10 points? Really? That’s 2 of 3 East games in which the Gamecocks have failed to break 20 points. I’m not sure how Deebo Samuel only got 2 touches or what Jake Bentley was seeing on some of those throws. Bryan McClendon needs to make some tweaks so that South Carolina doesn’t post a couple of offensive duds at home the next couple weeks and get off to a 1-4 start in SEC play.

Tennessee — The Vols aren’t going down easy

Man, this said a lot.

I give guys like Nigel Warrior and Jarrett Guarantano a lot of credit. They kept fighting against a vastly superior Georgia team. It was somewhat amazing that Tennessee was only down 12 on the road with a few minutes left. That’s a credit to what many questioned if we’d see from Jeremy Pruitt’s team. A little fight can go a long way. Pruitt’s emotions were a good reminder of that. I’m not sure if that first SEC win is going to come for Pruitt in 2018, but I thought that was a nice response after the self-inflicted debacle against Florida.

Texas A&M — Kellen Mond is going to have some growing pains still

The A&M quarterback couldn’t handle the Arkansas pass rush and made some mistakes that we hadn’t seen from him all year. It was surprising to see him struggle after we had already see him show flashes of greatness against Clemson and Alabama. I didn’t think that Mond made the right adjustments for the first time. It was a reminder that Jimbo Fisher is still working with a young, developing quarterback. Better days are ahead.

Vanderbilt — The defensive praise is in the rearview mirror

Allowing 27 points to Treon Harris and FCS Tennessee State isn’t exactly a sign that the defense is clocking on all cylinders. The Commodores needed a go-ahead touchdown and a defensive stand late just to survive. Yikes. Since that Notre Dame game, Vandy coughed up an average of 32 points at home. Surely that wasn’t the type of effort that Derek Mason wanted to see before his team travels to Georgia. Something tells me that by the end of next weekend, that Notre Dame game will feel like a lifetime ago.