Stopping Nick Marshall will be a major factor if Georgia wants to beat Auburn. (Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports)
The Auburn-Georgia game Saturday at Jordan-Hare Stadium is the seventh-longest series in the FBS and the oldest in the South.
The Tigers and Bulldogs will be playing for the 117th time and this one, like so many times in the past, has bowl implications and even possible SEC Championship implications. Auburn controls its own destiny in the SEC West. Georgia is still in the picture in the SEC East, but the Bulldogs have to keep winning and hope for a Missouri loss.
The game will pit two of the most dynamic quarterbacks in the SEC against each other in Nick Marshall of Auburn and Aaron Murray of Georgia.
“He is extremely talented,” Auburn coach Gus Malzahn said of Murray. “He has great experience. He has been in big games and knows how to handle pressure. It is all of the above. He is mobile enough to where he can hurt you with his feet, too.”
Georgia coach Mark Richt compares Marshall with former Auburn Heisman Trophy winner Cam Newton.
“Cam was a much bigger man, obviously, but Nick’s just as dangerous as a runner because of his speed and agility and those types of things. He can be just as effective as a runner,” said Richt. “I think they’d be throwing more if they had to throw more. From the film I see, they don’t have to throw much, so they’re just running it. They are throwing some, but there are not many games where he threw over 10 passes in a game because he hasn’t had to. We know he’s a very capable passer, and the times he does throw, he’s very impressive.”
But a bigger factor could be Auburn’s powerful rushing attack against Georgia’s run defense.
Auburn leads the SEC and is ranked third nationally in rushing offense, averaging 320 yards a game. Junior Tre Mason ranks second in the SEC with 1,038 rushing yards. Georgia ranks fourth in the SEC and 20th nationally in stopping the run, allowing just 126 rushing yards a game.
If Malzahn has his way, the Tigers will set the pace of the game.
“Our pace is a big part of what we do. When we are playing fast, that is when we are at our best,” Malzahn said. “Obviously, you have to get a first down before you do that. We will continue to keep that advantage. We are a little bit different than when Cam (Newton) was here. We build around the strengths of our quarterback, no matter who it is. We are a little bit different, but like I said at the beginning of the year, whether it is Chris Todd, Cam Newton or Nick Marshall, at the core of who we are, at the foundation, it doesn’t change. We just build around the strengths of our quarterback.”
If Richt has his way, the Bulldogs won’t let the Tigers play the game at their speed.
“We’ve been pretty good at slowing down the run,” said Richt. “We haven’t really stopped anybody’s run, but we’ve done a pretty good job against the run. We’ve done a pretty good job, like I’ve said before, of getting people into third-and-mediums and third-and-longs. We were having a lot of issues on third down situations. This is the kind of game that even if you’re having success slowing down the run, they’re still going to move the ball, they’re still going to get first downs and they’re still going to have a lot of third-and-mediums and third-and-short situations.
“It’s just by virtue of the way they do it, and it’s going to be hard to keep them from reducing the yardage on third down and having that run-pass threat on third down. That’s part of the reason why they’re so successful – they have very few third-and-long situations unless there’s a penalty. Every once in awhile, there will be a sack on a first or second down, but that just doesn’t happen very often. It really doesn’t matter what we did in the past. It matters what we do Saturday, and hopefully we’ll get them on the ground.”
Georgia junior ILBs Ramik Wilson and Amarlo Herrera have been among the SEC leaders in tackles all year. Currently, Wilson leads the league with 92 (10.2/g) and Herrera is fourth with 79 stops. Wilson has led the team in tackles six times this season.
Against the Auburn run game they will be very, very busy. The Crystal Ball believes Auburn will get the job done and stay in the SEC West championship race.
In other games, look for Alabama to keep rolling by winning at Mississippi State, even though Nick Saban is concerned about the Bulldogs.
“This is a very good team offensively. They can run the ball. They keep the ball. Their time of possession is good,” said Saban. “Defensively, they are in the top tier of the SEC. They are very well coached. Dan (Mullen) has done a great job there. They play hard, they are very physical, and they play with a lot of toughness. It is always important to play well on the road. Every place that we play is a difficult place to play and Starkville is no different.”
South Carolina will hand Florida a fifth consecutive loss, further adding to Will Muschamp’s uncertain future.
“We don’t really look at their record too much; we look at their team, their players, what kind of scheme they have and so forth,” said South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier. “We know they are very capable coming in here and beating us, we’ve struggle at home against most all the teams we’ve played as we all know. That’s the only thing we need to worry about is how we play and how we prepare this week to play Florida.”
Vanderbilt will knock off Kentucky for its seventh consecutive win in November dating back to 2011.
The thing I try to balance is our approach as a team and how we prepare, and also Larry [Leathers] gives me great pieces of information that I think are good to use to change perceptions,” said Vandy coach James Franklin. “One of the biggest challenges when we arrived here was changing perceptions. Larry always says he thinks that our most impressive stat, is our record late in the year. I throw that out there, but with our team it’s about preparation about our approach, and focusing on the fundamentals and real solid plans. I’m very proud from a program perspective that we get better every week.”
Ole Miss is bowl eligible for the second consecutive year and should improve on its 6-3 record when the Rebels host Troy of the Sun Belt.
