My Thoughts - Ole Miss

I wanted to watch the Houston Nutt show before I wrote this today. I got about two minutes in, stopped the DVR, and started writing. Before the studio show even started, there Houston was...after the game...shirt untucked...singing the fight song to the crowd and then yelling "To the band!" and sprinting to the other side of the stadium.

Maybe I'm just old school. I appreciate the enthusiasm...I really do. And many fans love it and base much of their opinion of Houston Dale on it. But "act like you've been there before" was the phrase I couldn't get out of my mind. I started trying to picture any other SEC coach doing the same thing. I started thinking about, if I was a fan of the other team, what would I think of Houston Dale if he sang and sprinted on my home field. The answer was obvious.

As for the game itself, I enjoyed the victory until midnight. As a wise man once said, you try not to get too high after the wins and too low after the losses. Houston Dale doesn't know that guy.

Unfortunately, the problem remains that the LSU game is the only meaningful game that this coach and these young players can prove they are really, as HDN says, "coming on." I realize that coaches can't look past opponents and that the preparations this week will rightly focus on Mississippi State. But I'm not a coach (and, some might say, not enough of a fan either) and so I don't have to follow those rules.

At this point, when decisions will soon be made about the future, I want to know where we stand. That may be unfair to the current regime...but the November 25th contest in Baton Rouge is the only "real" game left. With South Carolina's win over Florida, a victory against them a week ago might now have been considered a quality win. But yesterday's win in Oxford and the battle for last place in Little Rock this Saturday obviously don't qualify. (And, of course, wins over 1-AA and Louisiana "directional schools" are ignored every year.)

So like it or not, even after a satisfying and long awaited conference win, this coach is still in a one game playoff for how much control he'll maintain over his program. Some might complain that this "darkside view" tarnishes what was accomplished on Saturday. And maybe it does. But I would argue those in control of this program, whether they work in the Broyles Complex or not, are thinking along the same lines.