The day after

By Tim Cottrell
Sports Writer/Designer
Published: December 30, 2008

Here’s my return to columnizing. Definitely my favorite of the season so far. Too bad it took until I only have one or two left.

And here is my gamer for the AU-Alabama A&M game. A few observations from only my second trip to Beard-Eaves for a game:

- I don’t know that I’ve ever seen fewer people in a building than were in Beard-Eaves about 20 minutes before the game started. There might have been more writers in the media room.

- Having seen that A&M gave Alabama some trouble earlier this season, I forecasted a close game when the beatwriters and SID types were discussing it. As soon as they walked out for the tip and I saw that Auburn, which is a small team by virtually any measure, towered over the Bulldogs, I knew they were probably in for a long night.

- In watching the parade of assistant coaches, trainers, support staff and everything else, I kind of got a kick out of the fact that it seemed it was a rule that AU head coach Jeff Lebo had to have the nicest suit. Lebo wore a nice, shiny black ensemble and everyone else wore muted earthtones, except Lebo’s father, Dave, whose black ensemble was not so shiny.

- That play in the first possession that I referenced was really worse than I made it sound in the gamer. Barber stretched one arm out to rip the ball from the guy right at the baseline, went up and all the guy could think to do was lightly tap him for the foul. A&M coach Vann Pettaway removed the guy from the game less than a minute in. Talk about a walk of shame.

- The crowd wound up not being all that bad, by Auburn standards. At least from what everyone else there was telling me.

Also, you can read sports editor Mike Szvetitz’s stories from the Gus Malzahn introductory press conference here and here.

And, finally, I’m doing the domestic thing today so I probably yet again won’t have time for bowl previewing, so here are my picks:

Humanitarian Bowl: Maryland 27, Nevada 24
Texas Bowl: Rice 38, Western Michigan 31
Holiday Bowl: Oklahoma State 45, Oregon 42