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| Saturday, December 2 Auburn doesn't win SEC, but will play Citrus Associated Press | |||
| ATLANTA -- The ball skidded loose on the turf near Florida's
goal line, bouncing around for what seemed like forever. DeMarco
McNeil of Auburn was the only player who could reach it.
He dived and tried to smother it, but knocked it out of bounds
instead.
Florida retained possession and it went down as another missed
opportunity, another reason the Tigers (No. 17 ESPN/USA Today, No. 18 AP) won't be calling
themselves Southeastern Conference champions this season.
"When you're playing a team as explosive as they are, you have
to make every down count," Tigers coach Tommy Tuberville said
after a 28-6 loss to the Gators (No. 8 ESPN/USA Today, No. 7 AP) in the SEC title game
Saturday.
Count that as the main lesson learned for Auburn.
Of course, nobody really expected Auburn (9-3) to even make it
this far this season. The experts said the Tigers were too young,
too thin in talent and experience and too overmatched to compete
with the big boys of the SEC.
All season, they proved people wrong. Then came Saturday, when
they looked every bit the pretender, in a humbling display of the
wide gap between the titlist and the second-place finisher.
The most disheartening thing about the loss: They had plenty of
chances to make this a game, but didn't take advantage of any of
them.
"It seemed like everything was out of our reach," Auburn
linebacker Alex Lincoln said.
McNeil's near miss was just part of it.
On Florida's second drive, the Auburn defense tipped a pass. It
stayed airborne for a few seconds. But this wasn't the tip drill as
it's executed in practice. Teammates Larry Casher and Dontarrious
Thomas fought for this ball, then watched as it fell to the ground.
Moments later, Casher had another ball thrown right at him, but
he dropped it. Four plays later, Florida scored a touchdown to go
ahead 21-0.
"You have to make every play count in a championship game, and
we didn't," Tuberville said.
The killer blows came in the third quarter, when Ronney Daniels
dropped a perfectly thrown pass in the corner of the end zone. He
buried his head in his hands afterwards, knowing how few and far
between the chances were. On the next play, fourth down, Daniels
was open again in the other corner, but quarterback Jeff Klein
overthrew him.
"It's not like we didn't move the ball," Klein said. "But
every time we got near the end zone, we turned it over. You can't
do that against a team like Florida."
The Tigers had their bright moments, too. They create three
turnovers, but most came too late and produced too little.
One, at the end of the first half, led to a field goal. Another,
to open the second half, could have put the Tigers right back in
the game, but resulted in another three points. They trailed 21-6
and didn't get near the momentum change they needed.
Still, overall, this is a good season for Auburn. The Tigers are
9-3 and headed for the Citrus Bowl when most experts figured they'd
be 5-6 and sitting at home on New Year's Day.
Soon, that will be the focus of this successful season -- not all
the opportunities the Tigers left on the Georgia Dome turf.
"It was a game of mistakes, a game of turnovers," Tuberville
said. "Teams that lose are almost always going to be the ones that
make more mistakes."
| ALSO SEE
Gators easily win SEC title, invite to Sugar BowlYoung Gators play big role in securing SEC Championship | ||
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