Considering No. 1 Florida opened as a 24-point favorite, one would assume that they won’t face much of a challenge this Saturday night. Mississippi State is just 3-4 on the year and has lost three of their last four games. Their most significant win came on the road against a Vanderbilt team that is just 2-5 on the year.

But there are several factors that should concern the Gators as they get ready to do battle with the Bulldogs on Saturday night:

- The Gators haven’t won in Starkville since 1985. They were defeated on Mississippi State’s home turf in 1992, 2000 and most recently in 2004.

- Florida could be down three defensive starters, including linebacker Brandon Spikes, and defensive tackles Jaye Howard and Lawrence Marsh. Spikes re-injured his left groin last week and missed most of Florida’s win over Arkansas. With him on the sidelines, the Razorbacks rushed for 133 yards and finished with 357 yards of total offense.

- Mississippi State head coach Dan Mullen severed as Florida’s quarterback coach and offensive coordinator from 2005 to 2008. If anyone knows how to exploit Tim Tebow and the rest of the Gators’ offense, it would be Mullen.

- Despite their losing record, the Bulldogs have the 13th best rushing offense in the nation and are averaging 219 yards per game on the ground this season. Senior Anthony Dixon has rushed for over 100 yards in each of his last five games, including a 138 and a 139-yard effort in his last two outings.

At the end of the day, Florida will have the better team on Saturday night. Even without Spikes, Howard and Marsh, they have enough depth defensively to limit how effective Mississippi State’s offense can be. But there are more than enough factors that should have Urban Meyer concerned about a potential upset, none bigger than the Gators’ poor showings in previous trips to Starkville.

Will Mississippi State shock the college football word this weekend and knock off the No. 1 team in the nation?

With all due respect to Tim Tebow and the No. 1 defense in the nation, Alabama is the best team in college football right now – not Florida. Yet when the BCS recently released its standings for the first time in 2009, the Gators were ranked No. 1 and the Crimson Tide were No. 2.

I realize at this point in the season we might be splitting hairs when it comes to which team should be first in the standings. After all, both Florida and Alabama are undefeated and the Gators were the preseason favorites so it makes sense that Urban Meyer’s squad would hold onto the top spot.

That said, who is the BCS fooling? The Crimson Tide has beaten two ranked opponents the past two weeks and also beat a ranked Virginia Tech team in their opener. Alabama has also gone eight straight quarters without allowing a touchdown and Mark Ingram is running like a man possessed. (He rushed for 246 yards in Saturday’s win over South Carolina.)

Florida, meanwhile, did beat LSU in Baton Rouge two weeks ago, but barely survived a potential scare against unranked Arkansas in The Swamp on Saturday. The Gators were also the beneficiaries of a couple questionable calls in the fourth quarter that probably saved them from their first defeat.

‘Bama has been far from perfect this year, but the Tide are the most complete team in college football right now. The Gators may be undefeated, but their offense hasn’t been as explosive this year as it has the past two seasons and the offensive line is having issues keeping Tebow’s uniform clean. (The Razorbacks sacked Tebow six times on Saturday.)

I’m not surprised that Florida is No. 1 in the standings, but it would be nice if the BCS grew a pair for once and recognized which team actually deserves to have the top spot in the standings. I’m fully aware that Nick Saban’s bunch had the opportunity to beat Florida in the SEC title game last year and failed to do so, but that was last year.

This is this year and Alabama deserves to be in that top spot right now.

ESPN.com is reporting that Florida quarterback Tim Tebow returned to practice on Tuesday for the first time since suffering a concussion two weeks ago in a win over Kentucky. But Tebow still hasn’t been medically cleared to play against LSU this Saturday night.

The question now becomes: If Tebow isn’t cleared to play against LSU until Saturday, should Urban Meyer still play him?

The obvious answer would be “hell yes – what are you an idiot?” But even though this is a SEC game for Florida, it doesn’t mean that the Gators absolutely need a win. They could still lose to Tigers (a West opponent), win the East, play for the SEC Championship and then make another appearance in the BSC title game. Remember, the BCS system rewards teams for getting their losses out of the way early.

I’m not saying that this isn’t a big game for Florida because it is. What I’m saying is that risking Tebow’s health for this particular game isn’t worth it because the Gators could still accomplish their goals of winning the SEC and playing for a national title if they lose to LSU. Believe it or not, the bigger game for Florida is coming up at the end of the month when they host Georgia, which is an East opponent.

If Tebow is medically cleared to play in the next day or two and he doesn’t suffer any setbacks, then the obvious decision is to start and play him against LSU. But if he isn’t ready to go until Saturday morning or afternoon, then Meyer should consider holding his best player out and giving him another week to rest. After all, the Gators can still play for a national title with one loss, but they can’t play for a national title without Tim Tebow.

Besides, Florida’s defense is ranked No. 1 in the nation and LSU’s offense has struggled mightily in the early going. The Gators could still beat the Tigers in Baton Rouge without Tebow, which is another reason why holding him back if he’s no 100% makes sense.

Apparently nobody told Florida’s Urban Meyer and Tennessee’s Lane Kiffin that the game is over.

Via ESPN.com:

In looking back at the game, Meyer said Sunday he probably should have opened up the defending national champs’ offense. But he said there was no reason to because of the Vols’ conservative approach to their own offense.

“When I saw them start handing the ball off, I didn’t feel like they were going after the win,” Meyer said.

“The way we lose a game there is throw an interception. Why put yourself in that position? Let’s find a way to win the game. We’re not trying to impress the pollsters.

We’re trying to win the game. A lot of it had to do with the way they were playing. It made our life a little easier.”

Kiffin said he put his Volunteers in the best position they could be in to beat Florida. Then he took one more shot at Meyer, who said several of his players had been hit by the flu.

Asked whether he was worried about the flu also hitting Tennessee, Kiffin said: “I don’t know. I guess we’ll wait and after we’re not excited about a performance, we’ll tell you everybody was sick.”

“They wanted to shorten the game. I remember looking out there and there’s 10 minutes left in the game and there’s no no-huddle, they are down, I think it was 23-6 and [there's no] urgency,” he said.

I can’t believe I’m writing this, but I actually side with Kiffin here. This sounds like Meyer is trying to make excuses and deflect attention away from the fact that his team didn’t give Tennessee the beating of a lifetime when everyone expected them to. Watching Florida defeat Tennessee by 10 points was like waiting all week in school to watch a huge fight at the flagpole and instead both kids exchanging blows, they came out slapping each other.

The Gators may have won, but they weren’t impressive. And as I wrote after the game, maybe that’s the medias fault for hyping up a Tennessee massacre but the bottom line is that thanks to Monte Kiffin’s defense (and Tim Tebow’s second half fumble), the Vols were able to keep things relatively close.

As far as Tennessee not showing any urgency, Kiffin is right – he put the game in the hands of his tailbacks, which were the only offensive production the Vols had. Kiffin knew that defense and his running game were the only things that were going to get him a win, so he stuck to that plan.

Meyer should move on. Florida got the win and that’s the most important thing. Maybe the massacre at the flagpole will come next year.

It’s my own fault, really. I figured that after Lane Kiffin spent the majority of the offseason running his mouth and making false claims about Urban Meyer that Florida would come out and tear Tennessee a new one when the two teams met in Week 3.

But I came away feeling awfully unsatisfied by the Gators’ 23-13 win over the Vols in Gainesville on Saturday. In fact, I was more impressed with Lane Kiffin’s defense than I was with anything Florida did today. His front four pressured Tim Tebow all game and safety Eric Berry once again proved that he’s one of the best defenders in the nation, if not the best. I thought I was watching Bob Sanders of the Colts with the way Berry played sideline-to-sideline today. I could watch him and Tebow go at it every Saturday. (Did you see that collision in the first half?!)

Again, this was the media’s fault. We all figured that Meyer, a man who had no issue with his team hanging 63 points on Kentucky last year, would put together some magical game plan that would embarrass Kiffin and serve notice that he and Florida aren’t to be f’d with.

But there was no magical game plan. Tebow was good (115 passing yards, 76 rushing yards and a TD on 24 carries), but far from great as he threw an interception in the first half that led to a UT field goal and fumbled in the fourth quarter, which produced a Vols’ touchdown. Florida’s lack of playmakers in the passing game was on full display and it’s apparent that the Gators are hurting without Percy Harvin and Louis Murphy.

Florida’s defense was great again, although Tennessee’s offense is vanilla as it comes. Montario Hardesty is all they have and the passing game is non-existent with Jonathan Crompton under center.

I’m not a Florida fan, but I expected more. I expected the Gators to be up by 30 late in the fourth quarter and tack on another touchdown just for good measure. Instead, I’m left wondering if Florida won’t get knocked off again at some point this year. I know had Tebow not fumbled and the Gators went on to score in that drive, this probably would have been written differently. But if Tennessee had more playmakers on the offensive side of the ball, it’s not unfathomable to think they could have pulled off the upset.

Tennessee (1-1) at No. 1 Florida (2-0), 3:30PM ET
Don’t think for a second that Urban Meyer won’t be extra motivated for this game after Lane Kiffin accused him of violating NCAA recruiting rules back in February. Kiffin better hope that his power running game will help keep this one close, because Florida’s defense is going to terrorize quarterback Jonathan Crompton if Tennessee becomes too one-dimensional. Crompton made several poor decisions last week in UT’s loss to UCLA, a game in which he threw three interceptions. If he turns the ball over against the Gators, this game will be out of reach by halftime. Of course, if Monte Kiffin’s defense can generate some pressure on Tim Tebow, the Vols could make things interesting. But so far, Kiffin hasn’t gotten much production out of his front four and it has forced him to blitz in order to get pressure. Tebow will recognize that and pick UT’s defense apart. This one could get ugly.
Odds: Florida -30
Prediction: Florida 41, Tennessee 10.

Texas Tech (2-0) at No. 2 Texas (2-0), 8:00PM ET
Mack Brown still has nightmares of Michael Crabtree scoring the winning touchdown in last year’s thriller in Lubbock. But Crabtree and Graham Harrell have both moved on and although Raiders quarterback Taylor Potts (861 yards, 9 TDs) is off to a great start this year, it’s hard to imagine that Tech will pull off the upset this year. Colt McCoy won’t allow Texas to lose at home and the Longhorn back seven is too good to let Potts to beat them for four quarters.
Odds: Texas -17.5
Prediction: Texas 52, Texas Tech 28.

No. 23 Georgia at Arkansas, 7:45PM ET
The last time these two teams met was back in October of 2005 when the Dawgs barely edged the Razorbacks 23-20 in Athens. Bobby Petrino’s team is fresh coming off a bye week (which followed an easy 48-10 victory over FCS foe Missouri State), while Georgia fought tooth and nail for their 41-37 win over South Carolina. Petrino admitted that the Razorbacks have been game planning for this matchup since August and he even held senior Michael Smith to only four carries in the win over Missouri State so that the running back would be fresh for this week’s matchup vs. UGA. The Dawgs have given up 61 points in their first two outings and considering Arkansas’s offense is starting to come together under Petrino, I see the Razorbacks securing a nice home win.
Odds: Arkansas -1
Prediction: Arkansas 31, Georgia 28.

West Virginia at Auburn, 7:45PM ET
The Tigers will be seeking a measure of revenge after the Mountaineers soundly beat them in Morgantown last year. Although both teams have started off the season on the right foot, West Virginia could have a hard time corralling Auburn running backs Brandon Tate and Onterio McCalebb. The duo has combined to rush for over 530 yards in two games and will provide a challenge that the Mountaineers’ run-defense didn’t receive in their first two games. As long as the Auburn defense can contain Noel Devine and senior quarterback Jarrett Brown, they should be able to get their revenge on West Virginia and start the ’09 season 3-0.
Odds: Auburn -7
Prediction: Auburn 38, West Virginia 24.

“Waaaaaaaaaaaaa! Waaaaaaaaa!”

During a recent Gator Club appearance, Urban Meyer slammed former Florida quarterback Shane Matthews (although he didn’t have the guts to call him out by name) for the way he criticized Meyer’s game plan on a radio show following UF’s loss to Ole’ Miss last season.

“If you want to be critical of a player on our team or a coach on our team you can buy a ticket for seat 37F, you’re not welcome back in the football office,” Meyer said, according to the report. “You’re either a Gator or you’re not a Gator.”

The rift apparently started when Matthews criticized the offense following the 31-30 loss to Mississippi — the game that produced Tim Tebow’s now-famous postgame speech.

“When I watched the Ole Miss game and Ole Miss played our wide receivers about 90 percent man-to-man, it was a slap in the face to our wide receivers and passing game. I can’t understand why we didn’t take advantage of that,” Matthews said at the time, according to the report.

You’re either a Gator or you’re not a Gator? How profound, especially coming from a Midwest guy who didn’t become a Gator himself until after stints at Ohio State, Illinois State, Colorado State, Notre Dame, Bowling Green and Utah. Matthews was a Gator long before Meyer was ever crying about the way Florida is treated.

Former Miami defensive lineman Dan Sileo said it best in the article when he noted:

“Urban Meyer’s not a Gator. He’s a caretaker of the Gator program,” Sileo said. “Most times these coaches think they’re the programs, but really, the program is the players. That’s the problem I have with coaches whose egos get too big for their britches. If Urban doesn’t like it, that’s too bad.”

Meyer is always crying about something and it’s ridiculous for him to say that a former Florida player can’t be critical of the program when they lose a game. Most college coaches have egos the size of Michigan Stadium and they all think that everyone should bow down to “their” program.

What a joke. Matthews is in the media – he’s doing his job. He would be criticized if he didn’t bash the Gators when they deserve it and fans would quickly point out how much of a homer he is.

Lane Kiffin hasn’t even held the Tennessee head-coaching job for three months and already he’s managed to tick off fellow SEC coaches Urban Meyer (Florida), Nick Saban (Alabama), Steve Spurrier (South Carolina) and Mark Richt (Georgia).

That kind of preaching-to-the-choir comment fit perfectly into the rhetoric of his first press conference. I doubt it got much of a rise in Gainesville, since the Gators have owned the Vols in recent seasons.

What really irked Florida Coach Urban Meyer was that Kiffin continued to attempt to hire — unsuccessfully, as it turned out — receivers coach Billy Gonzales while the Gators were preparing for the national championship game.

More recently, Kiffin has gotten on the nerves of Alabama Coach Nick Saban to the extent that Saban is asking players who already have committed to the Crimson Tide not to take official visits to UT.
This is in response to Kiffin’s hiring of Lance Thompson off Saban’s staff. Thompson, considered Alabama’s best recruiter, got a big raise to jump to the Vols just two weeks before signing day.
Considering that UT is a combined 1-6 since Meyer and Saban arrived at Florida and Alabama, you have to take your victories wherever you can find them.

And don’t forget that Kiffin also has tugged on Steve Spurrier’s visor. First Kiffin hired his brother-in-law, David Reaves, off the South Carolina staff. Then Kiffin and Spurrier exchanged comments in the press about recruiting.

While we’re at it, Kiffin also threw a $400,000 offer at super recruiter Rodney Garner in an attempt to lure him off Mark Richt’s staff at Georgia. Garner chose to stay at Georgia.

For those keeping score, Kiffin has kicked sand at Meyer, Saban, Spurrier and Richt. It’s no coincidence that those are the coaches of the four most important opponents on UT’s schedule every year. Those are also four programs that the Vols must match in recruiting if they are to regain relevance in the SEC.

Obviously this is all part of Kiffin’s plan to breathe a little life into a Tennessee program that could use a shot in the arm. Is he going about it the right way? Probably not, although that won’t matter if he wins.

If pissing off your fellow conference coaches motivates the program and players, then go for it. But if nothing changes and the Vols get flattened by all of these teams next year, then Kiffin is just going to look like a pompous ass who got what was coming to him.

Kevin B. Blackistone of AOL Fanhouse writes that Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops badly needs a BCS victory before he begins “experiencing some belittlement in the Sooner state.”

The fact is that all these other influential voices on Oklahoma football will point out, should Stoops’ Sooners not beat Florida, that the national title Stoops brought back to Norman is nearly antique, having been captured in the first season of the new millennium. They’ll remind everyone that Stoops’ Sooners lost four of their last five season-ending bowl games coming into this Orange Bowl. They’ll point out that they lost three of their last four games against their hated rivals in Austin, Texas, and watched Mack Brown’s herd gallop away with one national championship during that stretch and attempt to lay claim to another one the other night by shocking Ohio State at the gun.
And the last time the Stoops’ Sooners played for the all the glory, they’ll say, it didn’t go very well at all. It was right here at the Orange Bowl, too, back on Jan. 4, 2005. The opponent was USC and when it was all over the Sooners were on the short end of an embarrassing 55-19 shellacking.

Urban Meyer can see it all too clearly from his side of the field, in part because he and Stoops are so much alike. Both are from Ohio. Both are fortysomethings. Both won their first national championships as head coaches in their second seasons running their current ships.

And neither said Wednesday that they could see themselves surviving in their vocation into their 70s like some of college football coaching’s idols. Why not?

“You’re a missed field goal away from being a bum with everybody else,” Meyer said. “That’s just part of the [coaching] deal.”

That is why Stoops needs to beat Florida. He’s unfairly close to having some people call him that bum.

Stoops has no one to blame but himself for why writers and other media members feel he needs to badly beat Florida in order to prove (some) of his worth. Too many times over the past couple years his Sooners have played flat and often looked like they had nothing to play for. Now a title is on the line and Stoops has a track record of blowing these types of games. It’ll be interesting to see if Bobby Boy can get over the hump.

Even though he’s in the midst of preparing his Florida Gators to do battle with the Oklahoma Sooners in the national championship game, Urban Meyer isn’t backing down from saying that his ultimate dream job is still to coach at Notre Dame.

Four years after spurning Notre Dame to take over the Florida Gators program, Coach Urban Meyer called the Fighting Irish “still my dream job; that hasn’t changed” on a South Florida radio show on Wednesday.

“Once my kids are done, maybe some day I’ll go coach there,” Meyer told 560 WQAM. “I don’t know that. That’s way down the road. Being a father and being able to recruit the best athletes in America within a 5-hour radius of my home, that’s why I came to Florida. I thought we could have a great chance at success.”

“It’s just that time in my life — to be the head football coach of Notre Dame, you’re on a plane recruiting because you recruit San Diego as hard as you recruit New York as hard as you recruit Florida, Texas, Ohio,” Meyer said on the radio. “It’s a national recruiting base. I recruited there for six years, and I spent every night in a hotel in an airport. I’m going to be a good father first.”

Granted he’s not saying that he wants to coach at Notre Dame next year, or the year after or the year after that. But one would think that he would pass on those questions during a time when all of his attention should be on winning another national title.

He shouldn’t be vilified for being completely honest, but I’m not sure it’s ever the right time to talk about another job that 1) doesn’t have a vacancy and 2) you’re getting ready for the biggest game of the year at your current job. The timing just seems a bit off, but that’s not to say this should be made into a big deal.