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For all the national spotlight, widespread adulation and media love SEC coaches Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, Mark Richt and Steve Spurrier have received over the years, it’s nothing short of amazing that the two men currently running the SEC’s lone unbeaten squads are LSU’s Les Miles and Auburn’s Gene Chizik.
To be certain, no one’s ever used the word “genius” to describe either man.
Hardly the rock star figures some of their SEC coaching brethren are on their respective campuses, neither Miles nor Chizik are making cameos in ESPN College GameDay commercials anytime soon. Sure enough, though, we’re six weeks into the college football season and it’s Miles and Chizik -- college football’s version of Houdini and Copperfield -- currently sitting atop the SEC West standings.
Their critics be damned, the weekly magic shows from these two coaches have been an utter delight -- if not, incredibly frustrating experiences for their respective fan bases to withstand -- thus far.
Auburn and LSU start the week ranked 7th and 9th, respectively, in the latest AP polls. Both teams won SEC games in mind-blowing fashion on Saturday; something becoming far more of a trend than an anomaly for both squads this season. In what’s being dismissed by some national writers and TV pundits as a “down year” in the SEC, LSU and Auburn continue to find ways to win their games every week, and win them in the most maddening ways imaginable.
Looking for a nice and easy 30-point blowout of a conference opponent at home? Want a conservative game plan? Look elsewhere. Want two undefeated teams that have both pulled victories from the jaws of defeat repeatedly this season? Then, look no further than the carnivals down in Auburn and LSU.
With Saturday evening’s 37-34 win over Kentucky added to the list, Auburn has now won four games in the 11th hour this season. Consider last season’s bowl victory over Northwestern, and that’s five wins in seven contests that have been decided in the game’s final moments. Auburn has beaten Kentucky, Clemson and Mississippi State by three points each this season, and came from 13 points down to beat South Carolina 35-27 two weeks ago. Chizik’s boys are college football’s cardiac kids.
But should they have to be?
Despite outgaining Kentucky 521-336 in total yards and grabbing a healthy 31-14 second quarter lead, it took a 19-play, seven-minute, game-winning drive in the fourth quarter to seal the Tigers’ sixth win of the year on a Wes Byrum field goal as time expired. Kentucky showed heart and courage in coming back on Saturday night, but it should have been put away early by the Tigers. The Wildcats were overmatched, but allowed back into the ball game. The same could be said for both Mississippi State and Clemson.
"To a large degree, it gives them confidence that they can win, because every (game) has been different and unique in its own way," Chizik said after the game. “The kids understand that in this league they're all going to be close, so it's helped us more than it's hurt us."
Chizik was considered a rather curious choice when he was hired from Iowa State back in 2008. That’s putting it nicely. Though it feels like ancient history now, athletic director Jay Jacobs was famously booed and heckled by fans at the airport when he touched down after finalizing Chizik’s deal, getting showered with chants of, “We want a leader, not a loser” and “5-and-19” (Chizik’s record at Iowa State) on the runway.
Kevin Scarbinsky, a reporter at the Birmingham News wrote at the time: “One former SEC assistant heard the news and laughed out loud. One former Auburn assistant, who worked alongside Chizik, reacted with stunned silence. One college football insider who knows both the current Alabama boss and the man Auburn has chosen to battle him said Chizik "is a good coach -- but Nick Saban will eat him for breakfast.”
Sifting through some of the initial reactions to the Chizik hiring back in ’08, you’d think Jacobs hired a middle school art teacher to run the team. Paul Clark from CycloneReport.com wrote, “What the hell Auburn is thinking is anybody's guess. And who cares? Because it just unburdened Iowa State of its most unprepared, overmatched and incompetent head coach of the modern era."
Over at the Auburn fan site Track ‘Em Tigers, a poster wrote, "To say this move is shocking is an understatement. For many Auburn fans, this is a worst case scenario. There appears to be little logic in the choice."
Less than two years later, though, Turner Gill -- the man most Auburn fans wanted -- is now at Kansas on the wrong ends of bad losses to South Dakota State and Baylor. Chizik, meanwhile, has his Tigers rated the highest they’ve been in both the AP and coaches polls since 2006.
As for Mr. Miles down in Baton Rouge?
Well, where do you even begin?
In his five years as the head coach at LSU, Miles has fought a constant uphill battle with both the Tigers faithful and the media. On his best days, he’s described as a “riverboat gambler” and given nicknames like “The Mad Hatter.” On his worst, he’s dismissed as the most fortunate of fools. Along the way, though, the fool has managed to compile a .789 winning percentage -- the highest for any non-interim LSU coach in 100 years -- and won a BCS national championship. Miles is a very impressive 30-13 in SEC games. Meyer, everybody’s coach of the decade, is just 34-10.
If last Saturday’s ugly 16-14 win over Tennessee was the first track on a “The Very Worst of Les Miles” mix tape, Saturday’s last-second win at Florida could have kicked off his greatest hits. Down three points and facing a fourth-and-3 from the Florida 36 in the game’s final minute, Miles sent kicker Josh Jasper on to try a 53-yard field goal.
The Tigers, however, similar to last week’s debacle vs. the Vols, oddly let 20 seconds dwindle off the clock before calling a timeout with 35 seconds left. Then, Houdini went into his bag of tricks and called the very same play that worked against South Carolina in the first half of a victory during the 2007 championship season.
With an undefeated season -- and quite truthfully, perhaps his job -- on the line, Miles had holder Derek Helton flip the ball over his head to Jasper, who was coming around on a sweep. However, unlike the 2007 rendition of this play, the flip was a wayward one, straying away from Jasper and hitting the ground in the process. Call it blind luck, call it magic -- but in what had to have been the most perfect of bounces in Tigers history, Jasper -- a kicker, mind you -- calmly picked up the ball off one bounce, trotted four yards, and converted the first down. After a replay review that felt like an eternity upheld the ruling that the ball wasn’t flipped forward, struggling quarterback Jarrett Lee connected on a touchdown pass to Terrence Tolliver a few plays later. LSU and their magician coach had somehow, some way, escaped again.
Auburn has a tremendous Arkansas team this weekend in what will be its biggest test yet, while LSU plays McNeese State. The two teams square off in Auburn on Oct. 23.
If you’re a fan of magic, mysticism and the complete unknown, it’s a date worth circling on the calendar.
If you’re an admirer of coaches who inspire their players to succeed when the stakes are at their highest, who overcome their own personal obstacles and who have found ways to rise above negativity -- well, you might want to tune in, too.
