Florida Newspaper -Florida Gators You might not be man enough to beat LSU

Horrors!!! Tebow Heresy!!!! GEAUX TIGERS!!!!!

Attention, Gators: You might not be man enough to beat LSU

Please allow me to borrow a line from former Auburn Coach Pat Dye as we count down the days until the Florida-LSU clash this weekend:

Gators, you're not man enough to beat LSU.

The Tigers from Baton Rouge are coming to take out your quarterback, take out your national title hopes and maybe take out the notion that Urban Meyer's spread offense is the path to Southeastern Conference dominance.

As Dye might put it, they're here to take your manhood.

Dye, the former Auburn coach, loves old-school football. The coach who built Auburn into one of the SEC's elite teams in the 1980s might smile when he looks at today's SEC standings. The coach who more than once has listed "manhood" as a requirement for winning SEC games would see evidence of his theory at the top of the standings.

Perhaps it's not coincidence that the SEC's three remaining undefeated teams -- Alabama, LSU and Vanderbilt -- are also the league's top three rushing teams.
While many teams have followed Florida's lead in adopting elements of the spread, power football is back in vogue. Is Saturday's showdown between the past two national champions also a referendum on the spread of the spread in SEC football?

The spread offense that was supposed to revolutionize the SEC is instead just revolting in some parts.
Look at Dye's former school.
Tommy Tuberville recently led Auburn to its greatest stretch in school history. Six straight wins over Alabama. The best record in SEC games since 2000. An unbeaten season. Division and conference championships. And yet he's suddenly very much back on the hot seat thanks to a decision this year to implement the spread.

So far, that decision has backfired. The offense has been abysmal and Auburn has lost its identity. On Wednesday, Tuberville relieved first-year offensive coordinator Tony Franklin of his duties.

Tuberville's team just blew a 13-0 lead on Saturday and lost to Vanderbilt for the first time since 1955. It doesn't get much worse than getting pushed around by the Nerd Patrol, who are now pushing around the SEC by being more physical than opponents. Interesting ... Vanderbilt! has become a bully by blocking, tackling and running the football. How quaint.
The Commodores run the spread, but they do it a bit differently than Florida and Auburn. The Commodores ranked 116th in the nation in passing offense the night they lined up against Auburn. Didn't matter.

Vanderbilt, as Dye might say, took their manhood.
Auburn, on the other hand, looked even worse in a 3-2 win over Mississippi State. And make no mistake -- LSU has the Tigers' manhood in a Mason jar after it came to Auburn and stole a victory through fourth-quarter grit. It sits on the shelf next to Florida's from 2007.
Meyer (left), the spread guru, isn't catching heat at Florida ... yet. But the whispers are starting.

What's wrong with Tim Tebow?

? Has the coach ever heard of a fullback? Why can't the Gators run the ball
What does Meyer have against running backs who are too big to audition for the role of Munchkin in The Wizard of Oz?

Why is Florida so soft?

When is the offensive coordinator going to get fired?

Sure, one can look at the stats and say all is well. Florida averaged 42 ppg last year and this year still leads the SEC in scoring (36 ppg). One can say the Gators fans are spoiled, and you wouldn't be wrong. They are.

But Gator Nation also is full of sophisticated football fans. They know winning SEC football because Steve Spurrier showed them what it was. Some of them can't help but get the underlying feeling that stats lie about Meyer's spread. To those fans, the 2006 national championship seems long ago as Florida has morphed into a finesse team.

Meyer's offense has yet to produce a high-quality running back not named Tebow. The stats say Florida is the fourth-leading rushing team in the SEC this season. What they don't show is that save for a few breakaway runs by the scatbacks like Jeff Demps and Chris Rainey or receiver Percy Harvin, Florida can't consistently get it done on the ground. The Gators can break big plays, but can they really line up and get the tough yards when they absolutely, positively have to run?

Florida's offenses under Spurrier had the Fun-and-Gun reputation but they also could blast an opponent off the ball when necessary. Spurrier's teams at Florida produced three 1,000-yard rushers and four of the top-10 career rushers at UF. They never came close to averaging 200 yards per game on the ground as Florida did last season. But Spurrier's teams often grabbed big leads with the passing game and then controlled second halves because they could impose their will running the football.

No question the spread has been highly successful at Florida in the stat book. No question it helped Florida win a national championship. But what about the recent win/loss column?
Lose to LSU and Meyer will be 5-5 in his last 10 SEC games. Spurrier never had a stretch that mediocre. But Ron Zook did. He went 5-4 over a nine-game SEC stretch in his first two years. It put him on the hot seat.

Lose to LSU and Meyer will have lost three of his last four SEC games at the Swamp. Spurrier lost a total of three games at the Swamp, period, from 1990-2001.

All the tiny sprinters in the world won't keep Meyer from criticism if the record keeps trending that way. And I bet I'm not alone when I wonder: What will Florida's offense look like when Tebow isn't around to (sometimes) get the tough yards?
Some nervous Florida fans and Auburn fans fall back to what Dye would call a universal truth: In the SEC you must be able to run the football when you need to run it and stop the run when you need to stop it.

It's about being able to line up -- blood dripping from mouth and steam billowing from nostrils -- and blast the man across from you off the ball on fourth-and-1 vs. Ole Miss. It's about being able to line up and stop even one of the five fourth-downs LSU attempted and converted last year in a 28-24 win in Baton Rouge.

Those yards represent Dye's manhood mentality.

This was a lesson Auburn once learned. After he replaced Dye, Terry Bowden won his first 20 games at the school. But he also began to run what could be described as a precursor of the spread, putting quarterbacks like Dameyune Craig in the shotgun to run draws and rollouts and relying on elfish running backs like Demontray Carter, Rusty Williams and Markeith Cooper to somehow gain yards between the tackles. As soon as Craig was gone, Auburn's offense was gone, too.

Over time, Auburn became less physical. The school that produced Bo Jackson under Dye became the SEC's worst rushing offense.

Yes, a poisonous relationship with a prominent trustee ultimately resulted in Bowden being pushed out just a half-season removed from playing in the SEC Championship Game. But also don't underestimate how much Auburn's inability to play "SEC-style football" contributed to Bowden's star fading.

Right or wrong, some fans at places like Florida and Auburn hold the view that the "gimmicky" stuff may work in the WAC or Big East, but it's not going to work long-term in the SEC. Right or wrong, they are nervous. Right or wrong, they are going to point the finger directly at the spread when things go wrong.

Right or wrong, some will call for Meyer's head. Or they'll call for offensive coordinator Dan Mullen's head. Silly? Sure. But this is the SEC mentality.

Meanwhile, there's nothing gimmicky about LSU. Tiger football first under Nick Saban and now under Les Miles is not dinky draws and end-arounds. It's lining up and knocking someone on their tails. It's brash. Tough. Physical. Bold enough to believe it can run you over anytime it needs a yard and stuff you cold when you need that yard.
We'll see if Florida is up to that challenge.
We'll see if the Gators are man enough.
We'll see if those those whispers about Meyer's offense grow louder or are silenced by the scoreboard.

This is the most brilliant thing I read from a Florida SPORTWRITER EVER!!!!