Oh really? First off, they play a completely different scheme. Secondly, they held their 3 biggest rivals to much lower point totals this year. Florida, Alabama & Georgia scored 85 points on them in 2008, 54 this year. I would say 10 fewer points per game is SUBSTANTIALLY different. They have also cut down on the opponents time of possession and improved the dreaded 3rd and chavis percentage that so many Tenn fans complained about. More importantly, Monte Kiffin has brought some dignity and stability to that staff. The administration is extremely happy with Monte Kiffin and quietly talk about him being more important than his son. The players are buying into his defense in spades and as they become more accustomed to his play calls expect better overall defensive stats in the future.
I am sure there are many trains of thought here, but to me, we should have wanted bama to lose. They are in the west, and an SEC loss by Bama helps LSU. A loss by Tennessee is meaningless to us. I get that you want bama to be as high rated as possible when we play them and beat them, but two SEC losses by bama help us more than a higher ranking when we beat them, IMO.
Being that we only have 1 loss and we play them. It helps us if they have that #2 or #1 ranking when we play them. So i was actually for Bama to win, because we play them, and control our own destiny. If we had 2 losses of course, root against them. That being said, i wouldn't have shed a tear if Tennessee would have beaten them, in fact its really hard to keep my line of thought when it comes to Alabama because i hate them with every fiber of my being.
It all depends on what you're going for. I'm still shooting for a national championship so in that case my logic is correct. Your logic lends itself more to winning the SEC (nothing wrong with that). To get to the SECCG, it would be better for Bama to lose, but I want us to make an impression on the pollsters by beating #1 Bama and #1 UF. If you can't tell, I like to swing for the fences. Of course, this kind of thinking got me two tickets to the NCG in 2007 on ticketreserve.com after our second loss.
