SEC Extra Points: Trash Talk Adds Fuel to Florida vs. Tennessee Rivalry
For more than a decade, Florida has owned Tennessee.
The Gators have reeled off 11 straight wins over their SEC East rivals and will look to make it 12 this weekend on Rocky Top in a rematch of what was the de facto division title game last year.
At least one Gator is guaranteeing a 12th.
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"Have you ever seen a duck pull a truck? Ducks don’t pull trucks," defensive back Quincy Wilson said, according to Nick de la Torre of Gator Country. "Nobody has ever seen a duck pull a truck. Florida Gators are going to win, simple as that."
"Tennessee is the duck, and we’re the truck," Wilson continued. "It’s just a metaphor."
Over the line?
Not at all, according to Wilson's own head coach, Jim McElwain.
"Somebody told me about that," McElwain said on the SEC coaches teleconference on Wednesday. "That’s a classic right there. I guess I have watched an Aflac commercial, but I’ve never seen that duck do it."
Tennessee head coach Butch Jones doesn't care either, citing the way that college students communicate these days.
"I haven't seen anything," Jones said. "We don't censor our players. We spend a lot of time educating our players on their character, their personal brand and what they put out there. Not only do they represent themselves, but they represent their institutions."
This is on the heels of an offseason full of trash talk between players of the two programs, including Florida defensive back Jalen "Teez" Tabor and Tennessee linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin.
Nobody panic. Don't complain about how games used to be played. Please don't hit the comment section with "have respect for the game" comments.
This is supposed to be fun, and the offseason of trash talk culminating with a 60-minute slugfest at Neyland Stadium is a perfect way to tie a bow on this edition of the rivalry and set up another offseason of verbal and social media jabs.
That's OK.
High-profile players know each other, go through camps together and get to know each other in a variety of ways prior to choosing which school to attend. Having a little fun, even if the specific players aren't close themselves, is harmless and adds more fuel and pressure to heated matchups.
"I’m not into censorship," McElwain said of Wilson's ducks-and-trucks metaphor. "Better go back it up, I guess...whatever he said."
Who Knew Purdue Was an SEC Farm Team?
Two former Purdue quarterbacks—Florida's Austin Appleby and LSU's Danny Etling—will lead their teams into critical games this weekend.
Appleby will start in favor of injured starter Luke Del Rio at Tennessee, who sprained his MCL in the second half of last weekend's game against North Texas on one of the dirtiest hits you'll ever see. He threw for 1,260 yards, eight touchdowns and eight interceptions last year as a part-time starter for the Boilermakers, before graduating and heading to Gainesville.
McElwain isn't worried and is keeping things as consistent as possible for Appleby in terms of day-to-day preparation, with Del Rio learning the game plan along with his fill-in.
"That room itself is the same," McElwain said. "In other words, those four guys are in there going through the install and [Del Rio] preparing himself just like he’s the starter. That really is what you expect from that position. We’ll take [Del Rio] on the trip for part of that reason."
Del Rio has been in the system for a year-and-a-half now and will be an invaluable asset for Appleby on the sideline. While Appleby has starting experience, Del Rio knows much more about what the staff expects, which reads need to be made and how opposing defenses have attacked the Gators through three games.
For Etling, things are a bit different.
Instead of fighting for status as a division front-runner, he's charged with providing a spark to an offense that needs to become more two-dimensional in order to keep head coach Les Miles employed.
Miles likes what he's seen so far.
"We watched his Purdue tape, and you could recognize that he could throw the ball, and you could recognize that he could handle all the things that his team was going through," Miles said on the SEC teleconference. "He’s matured, and I don’t know if you could’ve predicted it, but he has all the characteristics of a quarterback that we would like to consider our starter."
But can he win a game with his arm?
Last week against Mississippi State, the Tigers built a big lead and then hung on for a 23-20 win. This week's opponent, Auburn, has a loaded defensive front that has the ability to slow down running back Leonard Fournette, will get the benefit of the home crowd (even though Auburn has struggled at Jordan-Hare Stadium recently) and could make life difficult for Etling and Miles.
Over the last two games, Etling has completed just five of 16 passes for 43 yards, zero touchdowns and one interception in the second half. That suggests that teams are making halftime adjustments to him, which could happen sooner in games now that more tape is out for coaches to dissect.
However this week's games shake out, it's telling that SEC quarterback play has regressed to a point where two former Purdue quarterbacks are starting two of the biggest contests of the weekend.
A Little Help?
On the sideline opposite of Etling this week will be another quarterback whose mind has to be all over the place: Auburn starting quarterback Sean White.
The redshirt sophomore has taken the majority of the snaps for head coach Gus Malzahn this season but was pulled late in the 29-16 loss to Texas A&M last week.
Why?
Because Malzahn let him down.
"We put him in a bind three or four times [against Texas A&M]," Malzahn said. "From a coaching standpoint, that's one thing that we've got to correct, and that's one thing that we've worked hard this week to do."
Focusing on sticking to his bread and butter should be job No. 1 for Malzahn.
White finished last week's game 18-of-27 for 126 yards, was pressured consistently by the Aggies defensive front and dropped back 10 times (including a sack on an intentional grounding call) in the third quarter of a 16-10 game, at the time.
Malzahn used to pride himself on a power-based, two-back rushing attack. Why on earth did he call 10 pass plays and only run bruising running back Kamryn Pettway twice in the third quarter of a tight game at home?
Panic move?
It certainly seems like it.
Instead of trying to outthink the room, Malzahn needs to work the running game, work play action and stick to what he does best. That will prevent the sophomore from being put into those binds and give Auburn a chance in the "Buyout Bowl" against LSU.
More Than Hype
Don't tell Arkansas head coach Bret Bielema that 10th-ranked Texas A&M is a pretender, because he's having none of it.
The head Hog knows that things are ratcheting up a bit this weekend, when he takes his team to AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, to take on the Aggies—a team that has topped the Razorbacks in overtime in back-to-back seasons.
Bielema sees this as one of the most complete Texas A&M offenses that head coach Kevin Sumlin has produced.
"Offensively, they have a senior quarterback [Trevor Knight] who even though he hasn't been playing at A&M, he has a lot of experience," Bielema said. "He doesn't really get rattled. He's got a great group of wide receivers around him that understand the game. The biggest addition to this year's game is the running game."
He's not wrong. Texas A&M leads the SEC in rushing yards per carry (6.13), tied with Alabama for the most rushing touchdowns with eight, is second in total rushing offense (237 YPG) and has the second-most explosive rushes of 10 or more yards (22), according to CFBStats.
That's in addition to a defense that features two of the best defensive ends in the country in Myles Garrett and Daeshon Hall, and a monster in the middle who makes the whole unit click—sophomore tackle Daylon Mack.
"He does a great job with his first step," Bielema said. "He's a very explosive player. Very condensed and strong. He's not an overly long player—I think they have him at 6'1" in the program—but he can get across the line so fast and disrupt things at the point of attack."
Mack and the defensive line will be what determines the outcome of this game. Arkansas is founded on establishing the run and establishing the line of scrimmage and hasn't faced defensive competition anywhere close to what it'll face this weekend in Jerry World.
If that rebuilt offensive line has success, Arkansas' hot start will likely continue. But if Mack and Co. feast, Texas A&M will be the one that leaves the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex with the hype train moving full speed ahead.
Big Week of Coaching
If you told Ole Miss fans that they'd be 1-2 after three weeks with losses to Florida State and Alabama, would it be the worst news in the world?
Probably not.
After all, those are two great football programs that just so happened to be on the Rebels' schedule early. But after throwing away three-score leads in both, head coach Hugh Freeze is entering one of the biggest games of his career this weekend when his Rebels host Georgia.
It will show what kind of mentality this team, this staff and this program have.
Two such losses have the possibility of lingering. Freeze's ability to get through to his players and make sure they trust the process and focus on what they can control moving forward will test the mettle of the 2016 Rebels.
"It's a challenge, but it's not something that you can't accomplish," Freeze said. "You have to attack the week right with a positive mindset and provide great energy to our team."
All is not lost in Oxford.
The offense clearly can put up video game stats, after gaining 522 last week in the 48-43 loss to Alabama. As much as becoming the first Power Five team in a decade to toss away 21-point leads twice in the same season stings, the Rebels still have only two losses, still have a dynamic offense that can impose its style on competition that isn't as stout as what they've faced and still have the possibility of winning the SEC West in front of them.
That is, of course, as long as Freeze doesn't let Alabama beat the Rebels "twice."
Quotes obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Statistics courtesy of CFBStats unless otherwise noted. All recruiting information is courtesy of 247Sports. Odds provided by Odds Shark.
Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and national college football video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a host on Bleacher Report Radio on SiriusXM 83. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.
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