I’ll start with the bad news. Quentin Groves’ toe injuries will keep him off the field for the next few weeks. Tim Tebow’s proctologist tells reporters that Groves’ toes should be returned sometime early next week. Reattachment is scheduled for Wednesday at UAB.

Don’t tell John Parker that Groves will be back this season. The poor kid had the best night sleep in almost a year last night after hearing about the injury. I feel for the kid’s mom if Groves is out until the Alabama game.

What was the good part of the game? Most everything else. Auburn won that game because they gave 110%. I don’t mean that in a stupid sports cliché sort of way. I mean that in an ‘I think Al Borges has developed means for a perpetual motion machine’ sort of way. There is no way someone can explain the awesomeness of that game without acknowledging the second law of thermodynamics was broken somewhere in Auburn’s offensive game plan. As prolific as the offense was, the defense was even more beautiful.

Will Muschamp must have poured some gun powder on his Wheaties Saturday morning. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a coach more fired up. Looking at him, he seems to only convey two emotions; extreme happiness and extreme confusion. However, based on the defensive schemes Auburn kept running, the dude’s a genius. My Auburn fantasy now consists of Tuberville retiring in 2010 to become an astronaut and for ‘Borges and The Champ’ to become co-head coaches for Auburn to reign over a decade of championships.

Auburn’s defense has been criticized recently for gunning for the quarterback too much which has resulted in being burnt by running backs. Luckily, Florida’s quarterback was the running back. Thus, Auburn’s handicap was used to Auburn’s benefit Saturday. Tim Tebow was taken down harder than a UF conspiracy theorist at a John Kerry speech.

I disagree with Jim Fyffe’s claim that football players aren’t robots. Brandon Cox is without question a robot. The guy has an on and off switch. Commando Clutch and his faithful sidekick Rod Smith delivered first downs at will in ways that are not humanly possible. Granted, Cox is one of those super advanced robots which have the ability to bleed and feel basic emotion (boos sadden him). He’s somewhere between Al Gore and the terminator (I would say Cylon here, but I hope our target audience is less nerdy than I).

What else did we learn? Urban Meyer is a jerk. Even though Meyer has seen some great success at Florida, Auburn knows what ultimately happens when you hire a young hot shot quarterback who loves the spread and thinks too much of himself. Coaches are a generic bunch for the most part with the exception of SEC coaches. They’re so fun to play. From Fulmer to Saban to Oregon to Spurrier, they’re more like Dick Tracey villains than your average ACC coach.

The final thing we learned is that there is no such thing as a transitive property in college football. As horrible as the AP and coaches polls are, computer polls are no better. There’s no way to quantativly reason a loss over Mississippi State (they’re as bad as advertised) and a win over Florida (they’re good as advertised).

I leave you with my favorite part of the night:

Ryan actually went to the game. Expect his review soon.


E-mail Mark at mark@theauburner.com

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