Kiffingate continues: Will UT make a statement?
Will Tennessee’s athletic director come out with a new statement of support for embattled coach Lane Kiffin? Kiffin upstaged Pat Summitt’s 1,000th career victory last week with his verbal attack on Florida’s Urban Meyer and Alabama’s Nick Saban. With speculation beginning to percolate on the Internet that Jon Gruden could be interested in a college job, a statement of support for Kiffin seems warranted. Otherwise, the speculation of one and done will continue to swirl around the boy wonder.

Tennessee must say something as outrage continues to grow. On Sunday it was reported, the Pahoke Chamber of Commerce demanded an apology from Kiffin for his negative remarks about the people of the Florida community.

Will the Kiffin Bubble burst? Cecil Hurt of the Tuscaloosa News compares the upstart Tennessee Volunteer coach Lane Kiffin with junk bonds and subprime mortgages. Cecil Hurt writes, “It might be that relying on the ‘magic’ of recruiters Lance Thompson and Ed Orgeron and the rest is something like Wall Street’s reliance on derivatives and junk bonds instead of the real bedrocks of success — in this case, good coaching and hard work. Until then, Tennessee’s coach wants to live like a millionaire on about $10,000 worth of proven talent.”

Tide tennis going strong
Alabama Crimson Tide men’s and women’s tennis teams performed well over the weekend. The men’s team swept matches against UAB and Samford. The women’s team defeated the Oklahoma Sooners.

“This was a big win for us,” women’s team head coach Jenny Mainz said. “Oklahoma is a solid, well-coached team. I was impressed with how they competed and found a way to get back in matches when they were down.”

The men’s Crimson Tide team won all six doubles matches, and only dropped three sets in singles action.

“It was a great effort today by our guys to go out and get two solid wins,” said men’s team head coach Billy Pate. “I was pleased with the way we competed all the way through and in each spot of the lineup. It’s important to for our guys to stay focused on getting better each day, and I think we’re doing that. We have a chance to continue making improvements the next few weeks as we enter the meat of our season and conference play.”

Alabama falls to LSU
The Alabama Crimson Tide basketball team fell to LSU Sunday afternoon 76-62. According to the AP, “Mikhail Torrance led the Crimson Tide (13-10, 3-6) with 12 points. Senario Hillman added 11 points, scoring nine in the second half. Alonzo Gee, who was averaging 14 points a game, was held to seven points.” (Read the entire game summary embedded below.)

One thought on “Monday briefing: Kiffingate & other links”

  1. I actually watched the horrible telecast from Raycom on Sunday — am I the only one or is the picture quality on those games horrible? I know they are losing their contract with the SEC and ESPN will take over for the early games but jeez — if the company ever wanted to get another contract with SOMEONE they would purchase some HD CAMS — but anyways off that rant — this game was absolutely horrible — they were down by 20 most of the game — the LSU fans were in it too which punked out some Alabama players — I could tell the crowd was getting to them — it’s simple — I thought the season wasn’t over and I was hoping for a run in the NIT — but it really it over. I just feel bad for Phillip — he had to inherit a jacked up team but hopefully we can bring in a big name to shake things up —– BTW …. no WAY Mike Anderson is leaving Mizzou with all that Wal-Mart money — Pitino gets more attention up north and Bob Knight is way too old to recruit like you have to do now in these days —- I’m just rambling — I hope we get a solid coach in there to rule the WEST again ….

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