Everybody who watched the 2024 faculty soccer schedule realized sport of reckoning within the SEC was approaching November 14th. However hardly anybody anticipated whose reckoning it might be.
Tennessee travels to Athens this weekend to problem the College of Georgia in one in all two video games matching the ranked groups. (The opposite is No. 23 Missouri at No. 21 South Carolina. Knock your self out, y'all.) It's no shock that each the Vols and Dawgs come into the weekend with a better seed. It’s, nevertheless, a shock the place I’m staying.
One-loss Tennessee arrives in Athens with a transparent path to the SEC Championship and a first-round CFP bye. Head coach Josh Heupel and quarterback Nico Iamaleava lastly fielded a crew worthy of the hue and cry at Neyland Stadium, they usually buried Alabama's bones within the checkerboard turf to show it.
Alternatively, two-loss Georgia immediately finds itself out of the present (meaningless) playoff bracket and really near lacking your complete 12-team playoff. It's fairly the autumn for the 2021-22 nationwide champions, who totally anticipated mastermind Kirby Sensible to ship title after title within the post-Nick Saban period.
And naturally, that would nonetheless occur. However it's loads tougher for Georgia now, which suggests it's loads tougher for everybody. The switch portal, the riches of NIL (which might have each optimistic and unfavorable results) and absolutely the want to stay round, each Saturday each autumn, all added as much as this: one other Recreation of the 12 months in an already packed season of them.
Heupel, like all 21st-century SEC coaches, is aware of precisely methods to make the proper assertion of respect whereas saying nothing about his future opponent. “Extraordinarily gifted, extraordinarily nicely coached,” he mentioned earlier this week. “They play arduous. They mainly play sound. They make you earn it in each manner and one which will likely be an important, nice surroundings…”
You get the purpose. No one places motivational materials on the bulletin board anymore; social networks do that job nicely. Heupel understands how to not find yourself on an Instagram image with “He's going to marry the Dawgs” or another inflammatory line emblazoned in entrance of him. It's a smart technique, even when it doesn't make for thrilling content material.
Sensible, then again, did job of making some warmth on social media this week, though he coached it on his personal crew reasonably than Tennessee. He referred to as one in all his personal gamers an “fool” for celebrating with Ole Miss (technically, along with his mates carrying Ole Miss gear), then got here again.
The large query for Tennessee is Iamaleva's well being. The Knoxville Information reported this week that the electrical quarterback is in concussion protocol, although no official announcement has been made. Heupel proclaimed Iamaleava in “glorious form” on Monday, however a report on Wednesday listed him as “uncertain”. Iamaleava's availability is probably going the important thing purpose behind the 10-point streak and rising odds favoring Georgia proper now.
On the opposite facet of the ball, Georgia faces vital questions on its identification. Which Bulldog crew will present up on Saturday? The scary crew that gutted Texas and Clemson on the street and went 28-Zero in opposition to Alabama? Or the tentative, directionless band that struggled in opposition to Kentucky and regarded misplaced in opposition to Ole Miss? Will Carson Beck appear like the Heisman hopeful in his early season or the interception supplier of latest weeks? Beck's 12 interceptions lead the SEC, and each is a dagger within the Dawgs' fading hopes of as soon as once more dominating the convention.
So what's at stake right here? It's arduous to guess the CFP committee's actual motives, however losses — no matter opponent — will weigh closely of their calculations. That's unhealthy information for Georgia, which might't afford one other L on its file and expects to make the playoffs. (Is a three-loss Georgia higher than a two-loss program from one other convention? In all probability, however you’re what your file says you’re.)
For Tennessee, a loss drops the Vols into the seething cauldron of two-loss SEC groups. Momentum and a present excessive rating ought to be sufficient to get Tennessee into the playoffs and probably a internet hosting slot — assuming Tennessee wins, in fact, with Vanderbilt lurking. However a win would virtually definitely end in an SEC championship berth in opposition to the Texas-Texas A&M winner — once more, assuming the favorites win.
In order that's what we're taking a look at this weekend: an opportunity for one program to stage up, an opportunity for the opposite to maintain the gloom at bay. It's precisely what we wish from a soccer sport on the finish of the season. How about this? The playoffs didn't wreck the common season in any case.