Posted by ESPN.com's Chris Low
I apologize for being a day late this week on Hot and Not, but I was tracking Tennessee coach Phillip Fulmer's firing all day on Monday. The dean of SEC coaches is out at the end of the year after 17 seasons at his alma mater. That leaves Auburn's Tommy Tuberville as the longest tenured coach in the SEC, and as fate would have it, he's not on the most solid footing at Auburn. After Tuberville, Georgia's Mark Richt has the most time in at his current school. He's in his eighth season with the Bulldogs:
En Fuego
The Florida Gators: There's no picking just the offense or just the defense or even special teams with the Gators. They have it going on right now in all phases. Is there a more complete team in the country? We're going to find out these next few weeks, but the Gators appear to have it all. They have a Heisman Trophy quarterback in Tim Tebow who's playing more relaxed than he ever has and is surrounded by speed and offensive playmakers galore. The defense, despite having no senior starters, has limited opponents to 10 or fewer points in six of its eight games this season, and the special-teams unit -- Urban Meyer's own personal baby -- gets better every week. This team doesn't have the defensive line the 2006 national championship team had, but it's at least as good, if not better, just about everywhere else.
Hot
Alabama's defense: The Crimson Tide, coming off a 35-0 shutout of Arkansas State, is playing its best defense of the season. In its last four games, the defense has allowed a total of four touchdowns and is ranked second nationally against the run.
Not
LSU quarterback Jarrett Lee: On the surface, you look at his five touchdown passes and think, "That's not so bad." Then you realize those five touchdowns are to the other team. He threw his fifth pick-six of the season last week in the win over Tulane.
Hot
Arkansas quarterback Casey Dick: The Hogs' senior quarterback had his third 300-yard passing game of the season in the 30-23 win over previously unbeaten Tulsa. He finished 25-of-38 for 385 yards, only 2 yards shy of Clint Stoerner's school record of 387 yards.
Not
Florida coach Urban Meyer: Who calls two timeouts in the final 44 seconds of a 39-point blowout just to rub it in? Oh yeah, the same guy who kicked a field goal earlier this season with 25 seconds to play in a three-touchdown game.
Hot
Tennessee athletic director Mike Hamilton: Chalk up the hat trick for Hamilton, who's now fired the football coach, the basketball coach and the baseball coach since taking over as the Vols' athletic director in 2003. Tennessee fans hope he hires as well in football as he did in basketball (Bruce Pearl).
Not
Georgia's defense: For a defense that returned just about everybody from last season's team that finished No. 2 in the polls, Georgia has been a big disappointment in the games that count this season. In the two losses to Florida and Alabama and the win over LSU, the Bulldogs were scorched for a total of 128 points. Ouch!
Hot
South Carolina punter Spencer Lanning: He punted a season-high eight times in the 27-6 win over Tennessee, averaging 45 yards and dropping three inside the 20-yard line. Lanning is second in the SEC in punting and learned some of those wedge shots to pin teams deep in their own territory from his grandfather, Don, who's an ace golfer.
Not
Jacksonville traffic: The atmosphere is great. The tailgating is second to none, and few events generate the buzz that Florida vs. Georgia does every year in Jacksonville. But when you're sitting in traffic for two hours and only have to go eight or nine miles (and you leave your hotel more than three hours before kickoff), something's amiss.
Ice, Ice Baby
(Some) Tennessee fans: It's certainly not all Tennessee fans, but far too many were venomous and downright hateful with some of their personal attacks on Fulmer the last few years. That part of the Big Orange Nation should be ashamed of the way it treated a man who's given more than 30 years of his life to Tennessee. Nobody should feel sorry for Fulmer. He understands college football is a business, and that business was not what it needed to be at Tennessee for much of this decade. Plus, he walks away with a $6 million parting gift. But to somehow demonize a man who's meant as much as Fulmer has meant to his alma mater only gives those coaches who're out there now eying this job reason to stop and think, "That could be me in four or five years."
Chris Low joined ESPN.com in 2007 after 10 years with The (Nashville) Tennessean covering the University of Tennessee and SEC. The Rock Hill, S.C., native lives with his wife in Knoxville and has three sons.
