Jim McElwain has little problem with this whole belly rub thing. It’s not that his Florida team doesn’t deserve the praise, it’s that he might have gotten the belly thing wrong in the first place.
“Someone sent me a YouTube video that said if you rub an alligator’s belly, they fall asleep,” said McElwain, whose surprising Florida team moved another stop closer to the top four in Four In/Four Out. “So I’m hoping maybe they rub our back.”
Win or lose next week at LSU, the Gators’ place in the race for the College Football Playoff should come into focus. A look at this week’s Four In/Four Out:
MORE: Ranking the one-loss teams | SN's Dirty Dozen
Four In
1. Utah: The defense is suffocating; the running game grinds away on opponents. If you didn’t know better, you’d swear Utah was an SEC team – right down to questions at quarterback. Travis Wilson has proven he can play at an elite level. If he does so consistently, Utah can beat anyone. Up next: Arizona State.
HAYES: Utes are in Wilson's hands | 5 things we learned
2. Baylor: The starters played for a half and the Bears simply tried to get out of a laugher at Kansas without significant injury. Baylor has scored more points in its first five games (321) than any other team since the 1930s. The Bears shouldn’t be tested – and we won’t truly know what we have in Waco – until a brutal November stretch of games begins. Up next: West Virginia.
MORE: 5 things we learned
3. LSU: There, happy now? That was QB Brandon Harris, the huge question for surging LSU, completing 18-of-28 passes for 228 yards and 2 TDs – and no interceptions – in a big win over South Carolina. Who cares if it was against one of the SEC worst defenses? It builds confidence for the future. Up next: Florida.
4. Clemson: The sign of an elite team: the week after an emotional win, with natural letdown creeping in, you destroy an opponent from the first snap of the game. The completely rebuilt Clemson defense is giving up 16.6 points a game -- a remarkable job by DC Brent Venables.
MORE: 5 things we learned
Four Out
5. Ohio State: At some point, you are what you are. For those who continue to say Ohio State is bored and will eventually turn it on, you better start looking closer at how the Buckeyes are winning games: they’re not the same team defensively that they were in the last month of last season, and clearly there are issues at quarterback. Up next: Penn State.
MORE: 5 things we learned
6. Florida: It’s time we start taking the Gators seriously. As big as the Ole Miss win was, staying focused on the road and playing stingy defense in a natural letdown game is just as impressive. They’re still a work in progress at quarterback (who isn’t other than Baylor and TCU?), but the defense is as good as the 2006 and 2008 national championship units. Up next: at LSU.
7. TCU: Consider this: why are we picking apart Ohio State with the way it wins, yet celebrating TCU by the way it wins? TCU’s questions on defense are just as damaging as Ohio State’s. Just because one of the game’s best players (QB Trevone Boykin) makes it all better in the end doesn’t mean it eventually won’t become a big issue. Up next: at Iowa State.
8. Texas A&M: The Aggies have one thing the rest of the contenders in the SEC are still searching for: a quarterback (Kyle Allen) that can win games on his own. This is the spot last year where it all went bad for Texas A&M: the sixth game of the season against a highly ranked team (Mississippi State) with everything on the line. Let’s see how the Aggies respond this time around. Up next: Alabama.