The Works, zebra hunting-style

Insert "And somehow they still managed to miss half-a-dozen calls" wisecrack here.

Yipes, stripes. Jeremy's a wee bit upset about the officiating during the game last Saturday. As in "rehash the 1992 Auburn-Georgia debacle and cite a whole series of angry Auburner comments approvingly" upset. In a blockquoted nutshell:

That’s what I was thinking about yesterday. As my gut turned. As my throat swelled. As my legs couldn’t get comfortable. My Auburn heart hurt. My Auburn heart hurts. We were supposed to win that game. Everyone saw it and felt it and saw it and knows it.

I have no doubt Jeremy's far, far from alone in this regard and I gotta say, that pass interference call on the Dawgs' last touchdown drive may have been the single worst one I've ever seen.

But yeah, I'm taking the boring "the officials didn't lose that game for us" tack, because they didn't. Aside from that one PI call, I can't remember any notably bad calls or noncalls in the Dawgs' favor (I suppose I may find a couple more when I recap the game)--the others I think of off the top of my head were "questionable" and that's the extent of it. And, of course, the officials didn't drop an extra point hold or misfire on an open fourth-down fade. I don't begrudge anyone else their anger, but the JCCW's sitting it out and hoping for better luck next time.

Newsy news. Not a ton of developments from Tubby's Sunday presser, but two big pieces of injury information: Trott's probably toast for the Irown Bowl, and Byrum's knee is likewise damaged in some fashion, making Hull the kicker from here on out. Thus the decision to go for it on the
4th-and-2.

Which, frankly, was always the best option anyway. Auburn's offense still isn't to the point where they could expect to drive into field goal position again and Lord knows expecting the FG unit to come through on decent-length attempts in that wind doesn't seem especially wise, either. The choice to go was correct. (The choice to air it out into the end zone is infinitely more debatable, but as I said this morning, seeing as a slightly better throw from Kodi gets us a quick six, I'm not going to complain.)

The other bit from Tubby concerns the absence of Mario Fannin at game's end:

On not playing Mario Fannin late: "We threw the ball 23 of the last 30 times. We didn't know as much with him as far as protections. He was in on some passing plays. With two weeks to prepare for this game, there shouldn't be any problem. At the end of the game, it becomes a mental as well as physical game. He's not there yet. He'll progress along as we go. We just played the odds with Ben Tate."

Makes sense to me. I'd still prefer Fannin to get more of the touches Tate got/gets (though Tate ran better Saturday than he has in weeks and weeks), but I can't see how the presence of Fannin turns either of those last two drives into something other than what they were.

Some may disagree. Acid Reign, for instance, who does sagely note that 12 offensive touches isn't enough for a guy who goes for 108 yards on those touches. AR also notes exactly how bad it got on punt returns:

Punt Returns: F. Dunn caught the first one behind the 15, and retreated back inside his own five with a half-dozen Bulldogs all over him. A senior just CAN'T make those kinds of decisions! Dunn's second attempt was a fair catch with no one within 15 yards of him. Dunn's third appearance resulted in him letting the ball hit the ground at the 11, and be downed at the 7. Every Georgia punt resulted in Auburn starting at their own 20 or worse. We tallied NEGATIVE 8 returns yards, here.

Seriously: what on earth happened here? At least we won't have to listen to the three Daves tell us that Dunn is ranked fifth in the country or whatever on punt returns when he hadn't actually made a return since Southern Miss.

Well, that could have gone worse. Andy Bitter brings us a nice little recap of the AU men's hoops team's season-opening win against Missouri State, and lest you think that season-opening wins against lesser squads are something to sneeze at, Mark Gottfried would like to have a word with you (as would Jeff Lebo, who as you may recall kicked off the 2007 season on the right foot by losing to Tulane). Of course, whatever enthusiasm might have been generated by said win has to be tempered by the fact that--stop me if you've heard this one before--one of Auburn's players got injured.

Not an omen of good fortune. Last week, Jay Tate made an astute point (or at least, a substantially more astute point than the "I don't know why they're playing Fannin" point) about Auburn's offensive line:

Auburn was prepared to outlast opponents this season. Remember how Tony Franklin wanted to run 80-90 plays per game? The line was built to handle that. The "smash-mouth" stuff was ditched. Then Franklin was fired, Steve Ensminger and Hugh Nall went back to the offense they know -- smash-mouth stuff -- and now the line isn't ready for it.

Look, LT Lee Ziemba is listed at 285 pounds. He's a lean guy. He's also playing with a bum knee.

RT Ryan Pugh is listed at 6-foot-4 (he's more like 6-2) and 280 pounds. Pugh doesn't look that heavy to me.

Those are exceptionally light tackles in an era where guys at that position routinely exceed 300 pounds.

But their agility and quickness will come in awful handy against Terence Cody, right? Right?

Aaaaaaand finally ... a buncha big fat congrats to the Vandy Commodores, who are going bowling for the first time of my football-watchin' life. I quite honestly wondered if I'd ever see the day. What's simultaneously surprising and not surprising is that it happened this year. As Philip writes:

If you lined up the preseason press clippings for every Vanderbilt football team from 1983 to 2008, and rated them by probability that each squad would be “The One” to break our losing streak, where would 2008 rate? Probably behind 1992, 1993, 1994, 2000, 2005, 2007, and no telling how many others I’m overlooking.

That it did end up happening ay ear aheado f schedule is the surprise; but then again, on some level, doesn't the pressure of trying to make a bowl at Vandy mean that it was always going to be a team without much expected from it that would break through the glass ceiling? In any case, it's time to retire all the "Vandy in a bowl = apocalypse" jokes, or, as JRS memorably put it (in a post nicely titled "Yes They Did") -- "a black president and a Vanderbilt bowl trip ... America is ready for some m*********ing change for sure."

Apparently so. Good job, 'Dores.