With the unanimous No. 1 team in the country and with five programs ranked among the top 12, the Southeastern Conference again is entrenched as the nation’s premier college football league.
Alabama began this season at No. 1 and has strengthened throughout, with last Saturday’s 58-21 win at Tennessee representing the Crimson Tide’s eighth consecutive triumph by at least three touchdowns. The projected SEC championship showdown of Alabama versus Georgia is still intact, but a No. 9 Florida victory over the No. 7 Bulldogs this Saturday in Jacksonville and a No. 4 LSU defeat of Alabama next weekend in Baton Rouge would turn every preseason prediction upside down.
“I believe we’re better equipped than ever to play Alabama,” LSU coach Ed Orgeron said Tuesday while speaking to the New Orleans Touchdown Club. “Is it going to be a hard test? Yes, but we will be ready for it.”
Even No. 12 Kentucky is in the SEC title mix entering the last weekend of October, giving this league more intrigue than expected.
A summary of the first eight weeks:
BEST TEAM
This appears to be the finest of Nick Saban’s 12 teams in Tuscaloosa, which is saying something given that his Crimson Tide have claimed five of the past nine national championships. Alabama leads the nation in scoring offense (54.1 points a game) and total offense (564.2 yards per contest), but its most stout statistic is this: The Crimson Tide have covered the first-half spread all eight times this season.
Yes, they establish such things as first-half spreads, and Alabama’s tightest game at halftime so far was a 31-13 lead over Texas A&M on Sept. 22, an eventual 45-23 win. The average score of an Alabama game at halftime this season is 39-7.
WORST TEAM
A 44-17 home loss to North Texas on Sept. 15 put Arkansas way out front in this category. The Razorbacks, who are rebuilding in their first season under Chad Morris, improved to 2-6 last weekend with a 23-0 blanking of Tulsa and have their best chance at an SEC victory this week when they host Vanderbilt.
Derek Mason’s Commodores are 3-5 overall, nearly knocked off Notre Dame in South Bend and have lost leads the last two weeks against Florida and Kentucky.
LEAGUE MVP
Alabama sophomore quarterback Tua Tagovailoa is the runaway choice for the Heisman Trophy and has yet to take a fourth-quarter snap.
Tagovailoa leads the nation with an eye-popping 238.8 efficiency rating, having completed 107 of 152 passes (70.4 percent) for 2,066 yards with 25 touchdowns and without having thrown an interception.
“He’s done a really good job,” Saban said Monday while speaking in Birmingham. “He did have one Saturday that should have been intercepted. The guy dropped it, but he has done a really good job all year long. I think he’s really comfortable with our offense.
“We always say every possession needs to end in a kick, whether it’s a punt, a field goal or an extra point. The value is almost four points every time you turn the ball over.”
OFFENSIVE MVP
Kentucky junior running back Benny Snell has rushed 160 times for 868 yards (124 per game) and nine touchdowns, and he has done so while being the focus of every opposing defense. In the 27-16 win at Florida on Sept. 8 that snapped a 31-year losing streak to the Gators, Snell rushed 27 times for 175 yards.
Snell is showing no signs of tiring, either, rushing 32 times for 169 yards last Saturday night in the 14-7 win over Vanderbilt. He accounted for 74 of the 80 yards during Kentucky’s winning drive in the fourth quarter, including a 7-yard touchdown run.
DEFENSIVE MVP
Beginning the year overshadowed on an LSU defense containing junior linebacker Devin White and sophomore cornerback Greedy Williams, sophomore safety Grant Delpit is stealing the show. Delpit leads the nation with five interceptions and leads the Tigers with 8.5 tackles for loss.
The 6-foot-3, 201-pounder from Houston had 10 tackles and two interceptions in last Saturday’s 19-3 smothering of Mississippi State, and that followed Delpit’s blowing up Georgia’s fake field-goal attempt the week before.
SPECIAL TEAMS MVP
Texas A&M junior punter Braden Mann is averaging a whopping 54.5 yards on 27 attempts, and he leads the nation by more than 4 yards a punt. The NCAA single-season record for average, which requires a minimum of 40 punts, is 49.8 yards.
Mann also caused South Carolina’s Bryan Edwards to fumble away a return during a 26-23 win over the Gamecocks on Oct. 13.
It’s taking Mann’s very special season to top the year LSU senior kicker Cole Tracy is having. Tracy has made 21 of 23 field-goal attempts (91.3 percent) through eight games, with none bigger than his 42-yarder as time expired for a 22-21 win at Auburn on Sept. 15.
BIGGEST UPSET
Auburn was more than a two-touchdown favorite against visiting Tennessee on Oct. 13.
The Tigers led 10-3 early, but the Volunteers scored 27 of the next 34 points to establish a 30-17 lead on their way to a 30-24 stunner. Tennessee had lost its last game to every league member until that outcome, which was clinched by the stellar play of redshirt sophomore quarterback Jarrett Guarantano, who completed 21 of 32 passes for 328 yards and two touchdowns and guided an offense that was a robust 10-of-19 on third-down conversions.
BEST GAME
Sorry, Alabama, you don’t qualify for this category.
Perhaps the weirdest game would be more accurate, as South Carolina’s 37-35 triumph over Missouri on Oct. 6 was accompanied by such heavy rain that it knocked out the clock, the play clock and the headsets for both coaching staffs. It also resulted in the largest slip-and-slide of the season.
A lightning delay countered the return of sunny skies, and a 57-yard field goal by Missouri’s Tucker McCann with 1:18 remaining was countered by a 33-yard Parker White field goal with two seconds left. Guiding the Gamecocks to victory was backup quarterback Michael Scarnecchia, who threw for 249 yards and three touchdowns.
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.