Indiana Overpowers Oregon, Miami Survives Ole Miss, and SEC Basketball Madness

Two games. Two very different lessons about what wins when the margins are thin. Indiana didn’t just beat Oregon; they dictated terms with a veteran roster, a ruthless defensive front, and Fernando Mendoza dropping dimes to receivers who refused to lose at the catch point. When every contested ball turns into a completion and every bounce finds the right helmet, you’re seeing a team built for January. We dig into how age, poise, and the transfer portal created that edge.

Then it’s a sprint through the Fiesta Bowl, where Miami’s defense showed rare closing speed and Ole Miss answered with tempo, screens, and pure stubbornness. From missed picks that kept it close to a final no-call that will be debated all offseason, the game was heart-stopping football. The bigger shift, though, is Carson Beck’s evolution: fewer forced throws, smarter decisions, and a comfort with the boring play that wins playoff drives. Pair that with a defense that shuts down yards after catch, and you get a late-season surge that feels sustainable.

We widen the lens to the transfer era’s economics and ethics: why proven, older players are safer bets, why donors can’t fund infinite mercenaries, and what guardrails might restore continuity. Plus, quick hits on Georgia reloading its secondary through the portal and a tour of SEC basketball’s chaos. It’s a week that challenges old assumptions and rewards teams that adapt faster. If that’s your kind of sports radio, tap play, subscribe, and tell a friend what surprised you most. And if you’ve got a take on transfers or that final Hail Mary, drop it in our comments—let’s hash it out.

Transcript

Opening And Week Headlines

SPEAKER_00 0:12

This is Sports Takes with Nate Skates. No spin, just straight sports. Hey everybody, welcome back to Sports Takes with Nate Skates. I'm Nate, and man, what a wild week in college football and college basketball. We're coming off the college football playoff semifinals that delivered total chaos. One game that was complete domination and one that was a classic thriller. Plus, SEC basketball is bonkers right now. So let's dive right in.

Setting Up Indiana vs Oregon

SPEAKER_00 0:46

First up, the Peach Ball semifinal between Indiana and Oregon. We talked about on last show how Indiana's defense had given Oregon a lot of trouble in the first matchup. It didn't really seem like Oregon had fixed that during the rest of the playoffs. They were under a lot of pressure against Texas Tech, so we thought maybe Indiana's front would give Oregon a lot of problems in this game. When Indiana began the game getting an interception for a touchdown, I thought, okay, yeah, Indiana is really going to give Oregon all they can handle and more. Then Oregon came right down the field and scored a touchdown. So I thought, well, maybe, maybe this game is going to be closer than what it looked like it was going to be. It was not closer. That was the last good thing, pretty much, that happened for Oregon the whole game. And the amazing thing to me in this game was the Heisman Trophy winner, shouldn't have been a surprise. Fernando Mendoza's back shoulder throws and his receiver's ability to make tough catches. Anytime you're watching Indiana, watching highlights, you see these receivers make insane catches. This was one of the best examples of that any of us have seen all season. In the first quarter, Surratt had the incredible catch where the defensive back was all over him. Absolutely draped all over him. Didn't matter. Mendoza

Indiana’s Receivers And Mendoza’s Masterclass

SPEAKER_00 2:23

put it exactly where it needed to be. Surratt makes the catch anyway. Then Surratt had another catch like that in the second quarter, catches it with one arm, basically, guys all over him. A call pass interference doesn't matter. He catches it anyway. And Mendoza just really seemed like he was able to put the ball wherever he wanted to put it. And Indiana's receivers were able to catch everything. It didn't matter if you were you had good coverage, didn't matter if you were committing pass interference. Completely irrelevant. It looked like you could have had an NFL corner on them, and they would have caught it anyway. Charlie Becker had the insane catch for a touchdown later in the game. These guys just don't, like apparently they're just not going to drop passes. I mean, you throw it anywhere near them, they've got it. And another story of the game to me was everything went Indiana's way, and nothing went

Breaks, Bounces, And Oregon’s Misfortune

SPEAKER_00 3:20

Oregon's way. One of the first examples of this was you had the third down play with about 10 and a half minutes left in the second quarter. Oregon strips the ball from Mendoza. Ball sails into the air. Mendoza gets it, and instead of a turnover at midfield, which it very well could have been, it's a sack. Indiana punts. Okay, on that very next possession for Oregon after the punt. Oregon has the ball on their 13-yard line. As Dante Moore is getting ready to throw, he hits the running back Hill's arm. The ball flips into the air. Indiana picked it up inside the five-yard line. So that's a sequence of plays where Indiana has a ball flying into the air. They recover it, get to punt, get to punt. Oregon gets hit, has the ball fly up into the air. It's Indiana's ball on the five-yard line. In the third quarter, Mendoza had a great run, spins, an Oregon player's helmet, hits right on the ball. Ball comes loose, but it goes right to an Indiana player. Also in the third quarter, the punt that Oregon let go looked like it was maybe going to go back for a touchback. The ball bounced back, Indiana stopped at about the two-yard line. That's just the type of game it was. I mean, everything went wrong for Oregon.

Defensive Line Dominance And QB Comparison

SPEAKER_00 4:36

And I thought Indiana's defensive line was totally dominant. We talked about they had had six sacks against Oregon in the first game. They didn't have that many sacks in the semifinal game, but they had 10 tackles for a loss, three sacks. They were all over Dante Moore, just completely dominant on defense. On offense, ran for 185 yards, and Mendoza was 17 for 20 for five touchdowns. And you know who Mendoza reminded me of in this game? Mendoza looked a lot like a faster Matt Ryan. And I know we're talking about a guy who very well may be an NFL Hall of Famer. I would vote for Matt Ryan to be an NFL Hall of Fame. But what I mean is Fernando Mendoza's ability to throw the long out routes to the sideline. That is something Matt Ryan made his career on. That is what you saw repeatedly. The Falcons needed a late comeback, Matty Ice as he became known, whether it was Roddy White, whether it was Julio Jones, he would come throw those long out routes exactly where they needed to be. Get out of the receiver, get out of bounds, save time. Mendoza was really throwing that ball well. He had the back shoulder throw very well. He was putting the ball wherever he wanted it to be. And also, Falcons players used to say that Matt Ryan looked like a baby giraffe when he ran because it looked so awkward, long-legged, long strides. But he would run and he was tough. He would often get first downs. Mendoza doesn't look very smooth when he's running, but he's very fast. Once he gets going, I would say he's a significantly better runner than Matt Ryan was, although we'll find out when Mendoza gets to the NFL. But if there's somebody you would want to be compared to, I would say being called a faster Matt Ryan is bodes very well for Mendoza Mendoza going

Were The Ducks Ever Elite?

SPEAKER_00 6:34

forward. Indiana just really looked unstoppable in this game. They just looked like one of those teams that you see every now and then in college football that is just a whole lot better than everybody else. And that is kind of how Indiana looked. Oregon did have some injuries, both top two running backs out. How much of a difference would it have made if Oregon had been a little healthier? Uh, I don't know. It it's I definitely don't think it would have changed the outcome of the game. I think Indiana was going to win this game fairly easily, regardless of whether Oregon had been healthy or not. But the fact is that didn't help Oregon in this game. But Indiana talked about them looking unstoppable. Indiana has done what virtually no other program has done, not just this season, any season in the last 12 years. In the last two years of the college football playoff in the 12-team format, all other teams are 0-7 after having the bye. What did Indiana do? Well, they crushed Alabama in the second round game, and they followed that up by beating Oregon even worse than they beat Alabama. So the bye not bothering Indiana. And also, other than Ole Miss beating Tulane, which I think there needs to be a little bit of an asterisk on that game when we're talking about this particular statistic, no other team had won when mat had won in a playoff game when matched up against a team they had played previously. Indiana beat Oregon by 10 points at Oregon in the season, and then they followed that up by beating Oregon much worse the second time around. Indiana destroyed Oregon. And I think it could be argued that maybe Oregon was not really that great a team. They had not been tested very much. I mean, the other big game Oregon had was Texas Tech, and Texas Tech was coming off the bye, like we said, and Texas Tech turned the ball over four times. Texas Tech did not play well on offense in that game. So the question is, is Oregon really that good a team? You saw, I mean, in the Big Ten championship game, Indiana only beat Ohio State by three points. If Alabama and Oregon were really anywhere near as good as Ohio State. I think that at this point in the year, I think Miami, Ole Miss, Georgia, Ohio State were all probably better teams than Oregon was. It's just the way that the bracket shaped out that Oregon was uh was still in, and those teams were not. Maybe some other teams. You could argue maybe Texas AM is better. I mean, Texas AM lost a very close game with Miami, then Miami pretty well handles Ohio State, and Ohio State lost a three-point game to Indiana. So maybe Texas AM is better than Oregon. I know that's you can't really do that in college football. Say, well, this team lost by this much. This team beat this team. You can't really do that. But to take anything away from Indiana, I mean, that was extremely impressive. And I think what we have right now is going into the championship game. These are the two best teams right now. I don't know if they were the I don't know if Miami would have been considered one of the two best teams all season. Right now, these are the two best teams in the

Indiana’s Roster Age And Portal Philosophy

SPEAKER_00 10:16

country. But one more thought on the Indiana-Oregon game before we transition to the Miami Ole Miss game. Something that's been going viral uh since the game is that Indiana doesn't really build their team through recruiting. They build their team through the transfer portal. And they don't look for, they said this on the broadcast, Kurt Signetti does not look for guys in the transfer portal who are unproven. He looks for guys who are proven, who have already done it, who are already older. The average age of their team is 23 years old. That is a lot older than many of these teams who are playing young guys 18, 19 years old, who are big-time recruits. Well, Indiana's that's basically you've got a teenager playing a full-grown man. And that shows, I mean, Indiana looks more poised, they are not afraid, they are not committing a lot of penalties, these guys have a lot of experience, and they look physically dominant over what may be some of these younger, talented players. Now, I am not saying that is in any way illegal. There is a lot of people going around saying some things about Indiana, and I don't even want to really talk about that because there's been zero evidence to say Indiana's doing anything against the rules. What I'm saying is the way that college football is set up right now, just this absolute wild west of transfer portals, NIL, uh multiple transfer windows, just no real clear regulation on anything. Indiana has built this team the way that is totally within the rules and the way it would make sense for a lot of teams to build their rosters. I heard Joey Galloway talking about this. Why would you record recruit a freshman quarterback anymore? There's no reason to recruit him because if he does not play instantly, you have paid this freshman quarterback possibly millions of dollars to come be on your team for a year, he doesn't get the starting job immediately, he leaves. That is, it's not just a quarterback, that's a lot of places. Guys are not staying. I mean, even if they do play, even if they start, they might not stay. When you're talking about recruiting guys, it is in a way more risky at times than waiting, seeing how a guy's going to play, and finding a guy who wants to come transfer to your program. Now, personally, that is not the way I want rosters built. Uh, I don't think most people do. I think we want our rosters, I want we want rosters in college football to be built on guys who are committed to that program and are gonna stay uh tradition, legacy, all what we want doesn't matter. What works matters, what is legal matters. And Kurt Signetti has figured out that it is legal for him to wait, see which players are good, and get a 22-year-old transfer. And that's another thing. I mean, since the COVID year and the lawsuits for more eligibility, and you know, it's just it's gotten to the point where guys are playing six, seven years of college football, maybe longer. And I think that's gotta get ironed out. We gotta figure out how long these guys can play college football. I mean, it's been quite a while since COVID. And I've s I see a lot of inconsistency. I don't know all the the specifics, but Diego Pavia gets his waiver to play an additional year this past season. Then the NCAA denies Trinidad Chambless, who had been playing at Division II Fair Estate, his waiver request. He's now he is now taking

The Transfer Era’s Costs And Fixes

SPEAKER_00 14:15

that to court. I mean, we gotta get this figured out. This is just madness. And until more things are concrete and there are stricter rules, why would you not just I mean, why would you not just build your program this way? I know that Kirby Smart has said that's not the way he wants to build the program. And Georgia is one of the teams that takes the least amount of players out of the transfer portal most years. He wants to build a program with guys who want to come there, who are co coachable, who want to get better, who want to learn, and who want to play at Georgia with that coaching staff. I love that. I hope that that is something Georgia can continue to do. Um, I think in the long run, maybe that's good. But you've seen even this year, Georgia's had to take several transfers out of the portal. Uh, they've had several guys transfer off the team. It's just a reality that teams are dealing with every year now. The transfer portal is dominant right now. I mean, look at Miami. Miami has a transfer quarterback, Indiana has a transfer quarterback, Ole Miss had a transfer quarterback. But we talked about how last season Ohio State kind of bought, and I don't mean that, I'm not trying to denigrate them, but the the phrasing was the best roster money could buy. Ohio State went out and got Quinshawn Junkins from Ole Miss, they got Will Howard, they got Caleb Downs from Alabama. We've talked about this before. I mean, this is just the way it is. Whether they're storied programs like Ohio State, whether they're more upstart-ish programs like Texas Tech, it doesn't matter. Everybody's getting guys out of the portal, and you just have to deal with it. And I don't want that to be the way college football is, but until this is reined in a little bit, that's the way it is. You're gonna have to build your team at least partially, if not mostly, with the transfers. It's just the teams that are willing to do that are more successful and likely waste a lot less money. Which, believe it or not, I know this comes as a shock to people. Money is not infinite. Donors do not have infinite money, schools do not have infinite money, no one has infinite money. So eventually and I've I heard talk about this on social media this week, how many times are you gonna be able to hit those donors up for money? So a college kid can get five million dollars in transfer the next year. And there's no return on that investment. That's just a donation. So I don't think this is going to be sustainable, and I think that eventually we're going to see something done with the transfer portal. I I'm all in favor. I've seen people talking about um limiting the number of times a guy can transfer, or if you transfer, okay, you got to sit out a year. I was in favor of that to start with. That's how we used to do things, that's how we should have continued to do things. The only time a guy should not have to, or the only situations where a guy should not have to sit out a year, in my opinion, are if he is a graduate transfer, he's already graduated. Okay, that's fine. He should be able to play the very next season. Or if there's some form of extenuating circumstance. Let's say, for example, you live, let's say your family is from Columbus, Ohio, and your mother is sick and you've been playing at USC and you want to transfer back home and be closer to her, okay, that kid should be able to play that season. But we would have been a lot better off if we had kept the one-year sit-out transfer thing. We would still be better off if we did that for a second transfer. This transferring every year is ridiculous. I mean, I'm fine with guys being able to transfer, but going from one team to the next to the next every single season, I don't think anybody wants that. Anybody except maybe some of the players and some of the agents. So anyway, but until that is dealt with, I think Indiana's way is the way of the future.

Miami vs Ole Miss: Pace, Hits, And Heart

SPEAKER_00 18:34

Now, going to the Miami Ole Miss game, the Fiesta Bowl, do you see why I didn't want to make a pick in this game? And I refused to make a pick in this game. I could not figure out who would win this game. And this it ended up being an absolute barn burner type of game. And by the way, as an aside before I get too much into this, does anybody else think that the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl logo was awesome? And I mean, don't just Tostitos and Fiesta go together. Every year, you know, corporate sponsors changing for all these bowl games and the logos change. And I mean, I guess it's just the way it is, but call me nostalgic. I kind of miss when it was the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl rather than the Virbo Fiesta Bowl. No knock on Virgo as a company, just those don't really go together as well. But anyway, talking about the game, I said that the biggest key to this game would be could Miami tackle Trinidad Chambliss, not just get pressure on him, tackle him. Would they be able to stop him from scrambling and making big plays? Most of the game, they did a really good job uh containing him and keeping him from really scrambling around. Um, so very early on in the first quarter, they were able to get to him. They didn't get him down, but they were able to get to him. Miami's defense is incredibly fast. And that is something teams are having a really hard time with. This is not just a good defense, like Ole Miss played Georgia. Georgia has a good defense. Georgia had the fourth-rated run defense in the country. That they are a solid defense. They are not, Georgia was not as athletic on defense as quick as Miami is. And you could see that in this game. Ohio State saw that. Texas AM saw that. I said the other question would be: would Ole Miss's defense be able to get the pressure that they did in the Georgia game? I was very surprised with how old Miss's front seven played against Georgia. I would say they weren't as as good, but they were still pretty good. In the first half, particularly, they kind of contained Miami's offense. They had four sacks while Miami, which had had 12 sacks in the first two playoff games, the pass rush we'd been talking about repeatedly, the media had been talking about repeatedly, they only had one sack. So Ole Miss's front quadrupled that, the sack output of Miami's. That's how hard it is to sack Trinidad Chambless and to get sacks in the Ole Miss play style. You have a guy who scrambles really well, gets rid of the ball quickly, run a very fast-paced offense. They are wearing that defense out. See, something other teams hadn't been able to do on Miami was throw screens, throw short because Keonta Scott. Some of these guys were just too good, too fast. And Ole Miss was able to do that some because of how quickly they move, how quickly they get the ball out of his hand. And for Ole Miss, I really thought that it hurt them a lot when Keywon Lacey kind of went out of the game with the hamstring injury. You saw him have the 73-yard run to take the lead. He had been playing banged up for the last several games. I wasn't sure if the hamstring injury happened on that play or it had happened previously, had tweaked the hamstring. I think they had said his hamstring was tweaked in the Georgia game. But you saw him kind of pull up at the end of that 73-yard run, and he didn't play a lot after that. He was out for a long period of time, only had 11 carries for 103 yards. I think they really needed more of him. He was running really hard. He was able to take on that really physical Miami defense. And that was one of the calling cards of this game. There were some huge hits in this game.

Fourth-Quarter Fireworks And No-Call Debate

SPEAKER_00 22:36

You had guys just getting leveled, ball carriers really lowering their shoulder. Ole Miss and Miami were absolutely bringing it in this game. And you had some insane efforts like uh Tony's play, Malachi Tony, to get the first down. There's about 10 minutes left in the second quarter. He looks like he's down well short of the first down marker. Just scrambles out of it, basically crawls his way to the first down marker. Just this game was two teams who, I mean, they're just playing their hearts out. I did think Miami really could have blown the game wide open a few different ways. Uh you had Carson Beck missed a few passes where a receiver had gotten the step on his on the defender. Could have been a very long game, maybe a touchdown, and Carson Beck just missed him. That happened two or three different times. He did hit the big touchdown pass in the second quarter. Miami also dropped multiple interceptions. I mean, just what was it, three, four interceptions, just dropped them. And so Miami could have really blown this game open, but they did not. Now, for Ole Miss, not everything went right for them either. You saw Ole Miss finally missed a field goal. Going into the at the end of the third quarter, this was a 17-16 game. In the fourth quarter, it got even more wild. Uh Carson Beck or Malachi Tony had the insane touchdown on that on the screen pass, cuts it back into the middle of the field, finds a crease, just squeaks through there, then uses the speed and runs all the way for a touchdown. I mean, that's just a guy. I mean, Malachi Tony is a boss. He, and I'm sure you've heard if you've been watching the games, he reclassified to be in this class. He could be playing high school football right now. And I feel bad for anybody in high school who was trying to tackle that guy because we're talking some of the best college football players in the country can't tackle this guy. He is incredible. And then Ole Miss comes back, takes the lead with three minutes. What do you want? It was it was theater. Trinidad Chambless brings them all the way back. Ole Miss just won't quit fighting after all the off-field stuff. Then Carson Beck leads Miami to a touchdown with 18 seconds left, runs it in for the touchdown. So you had both guys just John Elway driving it down the field to take the lead. But then down four points, Ole Miss almost wins the game. They systematically, surgically, work their way down the field, despite only having 18 seconds and one timeout left, has the last play, the controversial last play from about the 40-yard line, throws it up into the end zone Trinidad Chambles throws it up into the end zone. Was the last play pass interference? I think it could have been called, but I felt like at the time, the and still do, the wide

Pride In Ole Miss, Surge From Miami

SPEAKER_00 26:05

out is fighting with a defensive player, also. This was not a situation where he's just getting mugged and not pushing back. Both players were pushing, both players were grabbing. That's very common on a play like this. Refs are generally not going to throw a flag in a Hail Mary type of situation. You got two guys shoving on each other. So you and you don't want referees inserting themselves too much into the game. This is the last play of the game. Can you imagine if you're the team on defense and the ref calls pass interference there and they get another play? So I get it. If you're an Ole Miss fan, you're furious, and I totally understand that. I mean, again, I know it probably could have been pass interference, but when both guys are fighting for position, both guys are shoving, I don't think it's a situation where Ole Miss should feel like, oh, we got robbed. Uh it just is what it is. It was a tough last play, it came down to that, and it didn't go your way. But this game was awesome. These teams were awesome. Uh and I think if you had heard going into the game, the way Ole Miss plays, if I had told you that Ole Miss was going to run 60 plays, and Miami would run 88 plays, that Miami would control the ball for over 41 minutes, that the Hurricanes would have almost 200 yards rushing on 51 carries, wouldn't you have thought Miami would have won the game by three touchdowns? But that's not what happened. Ole Miss just would not quit fighting. And generally, I mean, they're trying to run 80-90 plays a game, and they run 60 plays. I mean, when you look at the stat sheet, you're just like, how did this happen? How was this game this close? And it was just, it was just a tough game. Ole Miss just really fought hard and would not go away. They made the big plays when they needed to make the big plays, and they nearly won the game. And Ole Miss, as a program, fans, you should be so proud of your team. All the fans should be so proud of the team. All the chaos caused by Lane Kiffin, caused by LSU, yes, LSU, and you nearly made the national championship game. You have your coach drag you along for a month on what he's going to do, bails on you before the playoff. There's controversy the entire time about whether the assistants are staying or going, whether the players are staying or going. Uh, coaches are pulling double duty for both teams. And this was something I said uh a couple weeks ago. I thought Ole Miss had a chance to win the national championship game, but I was not sure what they would do. I wasn't sure how they would respond to all that. How do you it's unprecedented, really, that a team is going into the college football playoff without their head coach because their head coach bailed for what he thinks is a better job for a program that right now is not near the program that Ole Miss is. And I know LSU thinks very highly of itself. A lot of people think very highly of LSU. They've had some good years. Right now, Ole Miss is a better program than LSU. Uh, so he jumped the coach jumped ship for LSU, and I did not know how they were going to respond. I really didn't know. And they came and punched Tulane in the mouth, which was to me was totally expected, but a very good sign. But then you're you're going into this game against Georgia against Kirby Smart with an interim head coach coaching what his second game of his life, and you win that game. Then you're playing the red hot Miami, nearly win that game. And so to me, if you're Ole Miss, it's just what a season. And if you haven't seen it yet, the

Carson Beck: Growth, Context, And Narrative

SPEAKER_00 30:18

SEC Shorts on YouTube. I love watching SEC Shorts every Monday after the games, they had a great funny episode about Ole Miss and the effort and all the stuff they had to overcome, all that they dealt with, and still nearly won. So for Ole Miss, great job. I've I'm sorry for you that this is the way it ended, but you guys you guys should be really proud of yourselves. For Miami, uh just wow. Miami just really turned it on at the end of the season. I mean, I think they got the message from the playoff committee that they might not be in if they didn't really start playing better like they had earlier in the year, and they clearly responded and have been utterly dominant the last few weeks. Uh the defense has been fantastic. And I think one of the biggest storylines here of why the turnaround is the knock on Carson Beck, his whole career, has been the inexplicable turnover. We talked about that with the Miami-Texas AM matchup, and I thought he would turn the ball over as he had in the past. Carson Beck has hardly turned the ball over in the last several weeks of football. And he is not forcing things. There was a play uh during the game, I don't remember when it was. He had a receiver breaking on the corner route for what I thought would have been a touchdown. He had beat the guy. I think old Carson Beck would have taken that throw. Maybe he should have, maybe he shouldn't have. But instead, he had a dump off guy for a first down. So he threw it there and got the first down. And you look at his numbers over the last three games in the playoff, he's not putting up a lot of numbers because that's not what's important. What's important is winning the game. And when he needs to check, take the check down, he takes the check down. When you've had a defense like that and you've got the running game that you have, there's no reason to be a hero. There's no reason to play Wild West Cowboy. And I think Carson Beck has gotten that. He has settled down, he's an experienced quarterback. And last year, okay, I want to say one more thing about Carson Beck uh as a quarterback. There's been a lot of knocks on Carson Beck, and I think some of it's been completely unwarranted. Something people don't realize about Beck last year at Georgia. I have been watching Georgia football my entire life. I do not think I have ever seen a Georgia team or really much of any other team drop the ball as many times as Georgia's receivers did last year. It was it was a plague. And Carson Beck, you could tell, I mean, it it's as the season went on, it started to get to him. He's standing in there taking hits, delivering perfect throws, and guys are just dropping it. You could see that wear on him as the season went on. You could see it as in a in each game. He'd be doing well. Guy would drop a pass, and it would start to get to him. And he'd start feeling like he needed to force throws, try to make plays to make up for the fact that his receivers were dropping the ball a lot. This was something we talked about Mike Bobo last week. I'm not I'm not trying to do a everything is Mike Bobo's fault, fire Mike Bobo type thing. But this was something I thought he didn't help his quarterback with last season. Read your personnel, dude. I mean, the wide receivers couldn't catch a cold last year. And we'd be throwing the ball 45, 50 times a game. It just you got good running backs, you your receivers can't catch. Maybe we don't throw the ball 50 times a game. But anyway, one more thing I want to say about Carson Beck, and this is not really about him as a player. This is, I want to dispel what was a frankly crazy theme from the game to me. This idea, you heard Chris Fowler and Kirk Herbstreet talking about this, that Carson Beck has faced so much adversity and portraying it as though Carson Beck had to come to Miami to get a chance, to get a chance to be a starting quarterback. Carson Beck won a national championship at Georgia. In 2023, he was the starting quarterback for a team that lost one game by three points in the SEC Championship game, then followed that up by winning the Orange Bowl 63-3. Okay, well, then the following season, he was the starting quarterback again last year. They win the SEC championship game. Yes, he got hurt in that game. Georgia went to the playoffs. I'm not trying to say anything bad about Carson Beck. I'm I'm happy he's doing well. But after the game, after the game against Ole Miss, he took a shot at the SEC on social media. Oh, it just means more making fun of them. Dude, what do you have to be mad about? You were your career was made at Georgia. Your career was made in the SEC. Nobody has oppressed Carson Beck. And I don't know all the details that went on, but what I do know is when Carson Beck got hurt last year, it was being reported that he would not communicate with Georgia's coaches. He wasn't around with the team. He wouldn't deal with the team doctors. He's MIA from the SEC Championship game to the Sugar Bowl. Then he just shows up at the Sugar Bowl on the sidelines. Nobody even knew if he was going to be there or not. Then, right after that, he bails on Georgia, took a huge pile of cash to go to Miami, the school where his social media influencer girlfriend was at. Yes,

Georgia Reloads Through The Portal

SPEAKER_00 36:18

getting the injury in the SEC Championship game was adversity. Yes, some people have been absurdly hateful to Carson Beck on social media. And yes, he had his Lamborghini stolen. But guess what? He had a Lamborghini, and he got a Lamborghini making all that money at Georgia as the starting quarterback. He was not pushed out as the starting quarterback at Georgia. So save me the sob story about the adversity Carson Beck has been through. I understand the injury was rough, but don't act like he was mistreated at Georgia or anything. I see this happen all the time. We try to make some sob story about a quarterback so many times. It's not genuine. So anyway, I mean, I'm happy for the guy, but let's not pretend you're the multi-million dollar star is got run out of Georgia. And speaking of Georgia, I want to talk a little bit of Georgia football news. We talked about some whole some issues. Um, a lot of guys going to the NFL, a lot of guys transferring. Georgia is filling a lot of those spots with transfers. Uh since just in the last several days, Georgia has signed several transfers. We talked about a couple of those the other day, but they have also signed since then wide receiver Isaiah Canyon here from Georgia Tech, USC cornerback Braylon Conley, got Ameris Williams from Auburn defensive end, ECU safety Jamar Lee Riddle, uh Kentucky running back Dante Dowd, and Oklahoma defensive back Gentry Williams. So Kirby Smart is really addressing the particularly the defensive back issue, which was where Georgia was going to be very thin with transfers and guys who have played have experience playing. And I think that's a very smart move for what is going to be a very young, very thin defensive backfield without these transfers.

SEC Basketball Is Wide Open

SPEAKER_00 38:30

Now, switching to SC switching to SEC basketball. This is SEC basketball for you this year. Alabama hummels Kentucky, then follows that up by losing close to Vanderbilt and Texas. Texas lost to Mississippi State and Tennessee, then beat Alabama. Mississippi State beat Texas and Oklahoma by nearly twenty points, then gets crushed by Kentucky. Kentucky loses to Alabama and Missouri, then dominates Mississippi State. Missouri beats Florida and Kentucky, loses to Ole Miss. Ole Miss loses to Oklahoma and Arkansas, beats Missouri. Arkansas beats Ole Miss and Tennessee, loses big to Auburn. Auburn loses to Georgia and Texas AM, beats Arkansas. Georgia beats Auburn and South Carolina, gets destroyed by Florida. Florida loses to Missouri, then follows that up, crushing Georgia and Tennessee. That's the SEC for you. There are a lot of good teams that are flawed. There are not many, if any, great teams in the SEC right now. It is a deep conference. It is not an elite. Conference like it was last year. And it's silly to think any conference could be that good again the next year. I think what you're seeing in is very early, but I think what you're seeing is we have a lot of teams that are about the same as far as how how good these teams are. What we're trying to figure out as the season goes on is which teams will improve, which teams will rise to the top, because right now there's not really any good way to sort these teams out. I I would say right now it looks like Vanderbilt is is the top. Florida, Texas, AM, those are looking like the better teams. I think right now you might could argue Kentucky's really not that far off from some of these top teams, which sounds ridiculous following, you know, opening two losses, but uh Alabama's probably near the top, but they follow that up win over Kentucky with two losses. And so I don't know. Like I said, I would say Vandy, Florida, maybe Texas AM, those are looking like your top three teams right now. Uh you could make an argument for Alabama, Auburn, maybe Missouri. Um, I think Georgia's near that upper echelon, but the the jury's still kind of out on Georgia, and we'll talk about Georgia here in a second. Arkansas and Tennessee, man, what's going on with Arkansas and Tennessee? I mean, Tennessee

Georgia Hoops: Adjustments And Inside Play

SPEAKER_00 41:35

has had a wild year. You're beating teams like Houston, pummeling Louisville, and then just getting run out of the gym by Florida, you know, uh has the loss to Arkansas by 11 points. This this was not a good week for Tennessee, uh, other than the win over Texas. And then Arkansas, I mean, just gets dominated by Auburn. So I don't know. I don't know what to tell you about some of these teams right now. Um, we'll just have to watch them more, see how see if anybody becomes more consistent, see as teams improve, young players improve, uh, teams gel better. And I think that was part of the thing for Kentucky, and we're gonna talk about Kentucky here in a minute, but uh guys are getting healthy, guys are playing together more, and things are improving. So, about Georgia. So, Georgia comes back from the really bad loss to Florida and beats South Carolina at South Carolina. I think this was a good, you know, there's a lot of good to take about this. You're following up a very disappointing loss after getting your highest ranking since 2003. And we talked about the rebounding problems Georgia has had. This was a SEC road game that did not start well for Georgia. Uh, the once dominant offense for Georgia, which I believe is still ranked number one, has really struggled the last two games. And for most of the game, South Carolina pretty well controlled the game, controlled everything. They built a lead as large as 12 points in this game. Georgia struggled to shoot, again, six for 27 from three-point range. Again, Georgia is 303rd currently in three-point percent. That doesn't scream uh number one offense. South Carolina held Georgia to 75 points, but Georgia did not give a rallied from down 62 to 54 with eight minutes 45 seconds left. You had Keon Ketchings had 20 points. He shot four of four for nine on three-point shots. So that's other than Keon Ketchings, you're two for eighteen on three-pointers. Ketchings had seven rebounds, four assists. Surreal, Santo Surreal had 18 points. That's his career high in only 22 minutes. Only played 22 minutes, had five rebounds, three blocks. Uh, I Georgia still didn't look great with the rebounds, but they did win the rebounding margin 38-35 in this game. That's huge after just getting crushed on the glass against Auburn and Florida. And so I know Georgia wants to shoot those threes in this offense. That's, I mean, that's part of the running small lineup shooting threes. And at times, Georgia gets hot from three. Smurf Miller uh is generally pretty consistent with the threes. Occasionally, Blue Kane will get hot from three. Jeremiah Wilkinson, Keon Ketchings might get hot from three. But this is a team that generally really struggles with hitting many threes. And I feel like when you have a player like Samto Surreal inside, you need to feed him more. And in this game against South Carolina, they took a lot of ill-advised shots, just kept shooting threes when they were not hitting them. But in the second half, Georgia started giving it to Surreal, and that seemed to be a big part of

Kentucky’s Defensive Identity Returns

SPEAKER_00 45:29

the difference. I'm hoping that is something maybe they are learning. You know, hey, we've got an absolute horse inside. Let's feed this guy. We don't have to, you know, let's work them in the paint. Then maybe we see if we can hit some threes once we get going. I mean, Georgia got the name Dunkyard Dogs dunking. You know, getting to the rim. Georgia is going to play Ole Miss Wednesday night. We'll see how that goes. Ole Miss had the big win on Saturday. So we'll see if Georgia's able to kind of get the offense back on track. Now, Kentucky. Kentucky from Mississippi State. Talked about last episode. I was not sure how would Kentucky would be able to score with Josh Hubbard, who had scored 38 against Texas, 30 in the following game. He was averaging about 22, 23 points a game. Would Kentucky be able to score? I mean, they haven't been able to hit the threes. The offenses look pretty bad. In this game, Mississippi State gets out to a big lead. They're up 12 in the first half. Kentucky ends up blowing them out in this game. Kentucky was much better in a lot of areas in this game. They shot 41% from three. That's an improvement. And the issue with defending three-point shots that I've brought up a couple times, Mississippi State was three for 20 from three. You know, some of that could be bad shooting, but it's clearly bodes well for your three-point defense when they are shooting about 15%. Assists. We talked about that being a big problem for Kentucky. Kentucky had 21 assists in the game. Kentucky easily won the rebounding battle, 36 to 28. But really to me, what jumps off the page is the 14 steals. And historically, I say this as a Georgia fan who more has watched Kentucky more from the outside and being a victim of this. Kentucky is rolls when they are applying a lot of defensive pressure, getting a lot of steals. I can't tell you how many times I used to just be so upset watching Kentucky run full court press on Georgia, forcing the turnovers, really being physical on defense, and Georgia just felt there's just nothing Georgia could do about it. Couldn't even get it up the floor a lot of times. And then Georgia could never do that to Kentucky. And I'm assuming that was a largely a athlete advantage. And Kentucky has an athlete advantage right now. And I think that the 14 steals, that's how you get a lot of these points in the paint. That's how you get a lot of these three-pointers. This, I mean, you're off that fuels your offense, and it certainly alleviates a lot of the problems on defense if you don't have to defend 14 extra times. So I think Kentucky looked a lot better. They were they didn't turn the ball over so much. Nine turnovers, turnovers were a little bit down. So Kentucky, I mean, Mississippi State has started out pretty hot in SCC play, but we're not really sure what we're get what you're getting with Mississippi State. So, I mean, you don't want to read too much into one game there. But this was a this was much better showing for Kentucky. Kentucky will play LSU on Wednesday. And I would ex I would expect Kentucky to probably win that game. It might even be similar fashion to the result in the Mississippi State game.

What’s Next: Title Preview And Schedule

SPEAKER_00 49:04

For our next show, national championship game, college football national championship game between Indiana and Miami is on Monday night. Don't ask me why they decide to do that, but that's how they always do it. So before that game, and I'm not entirely sure what day it's going to be, I'm going to put out a preview show for that game. Uh probably try to have it out Friday, Saturday, something like that, but definitely we'll try to get it out before the game. Uh we'll also talk some more college basketball with college basketball going. And then on Tuesday, we will have the reaction to the national championship game winner. And I will make my predictions on the next show. I I think this is gonna be a really good game. I do just looking at it right now, Indiana. Indiana looks really hard to beat, but I also think they're gonna be under a lot more pressure defensively. Or I think uh Miami's gonna get a lot more pressure on them on defense than Oregon was able to do. So we'll see. I'll break down that game, see who I think's gonna win. So make sure you tune in for that show. And uh again, anytime. Thank you guys for listening. If you could subscribe, follow, uh, give me a like, and let me know any comments, feedback you have on the show. Thanks.