The afternoon games are in full swing, so its time to do this thing. Your week 12 College Gameday review has arrived. Today’s show was broadcasting live from Tuscaloosa, Alabama for the huge matchup between the undefeated Mississippi State Bulldogs and the Alabama Crimson Tide.
As of the show start time, I believe it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 26 degrees in Tuscaloosa, but that didn’t stop one brave fan from proving his toughness/insanity by showing up at least shirtless, while holding the “I’M NAKED” sign. We never saw his lower body, but this reporter will speculate that he surely had at least a pair of tidy-whities on.

Other notable signs included “Jameis Winston’s Lawyer for Heisman” and “Auburn fumbled my other sign”, but this week’s undisputed winner was the following:

While we are talking about the above screenshot, everyone will be excited to know that Herbie was back with the “KIRK HERBSTREIT LAPEL ROSETTE OF THE WEEK”. There is still a lot of speculation going on about this, and while I am sure it is nothing more than an extra little bit of flair for his suit, I assure you our crack investigation team will get to the bottom of this.
The audience at our house was incredibly excited (or not) to see the return of one Babi Mac, who was wowing the crowd in Tuscaloosa with tunes. I still don’t get how she got added to this cast of characters on Gameday, and I find it strange.
There was a duo of touching segments today featuring emotional stories from Tom Rinaldi and Gene W. The first was the tragic story of former Auburn tight end Philip Lutzenkirchen who had his life cut short at the age of 23. Philip holds the record at Auburn for the most touchdowns by a tight end, was described as an incredibly funny guy, and won the 2010 national championship before his career was ended two years later by a hip injury. Philip’s dad then took over telling the story of how he got a phone call from the police one night telling him that his son was killed in a car wreck. After further investigation, it was found that Philip and his passenger were both legally intoxicated and not wearing seat belts. Philip’s father now tours the country speaking about his son, stressing the importance of making good decisions in life as well as the point that life is a privilege; not a right. Check out the full video here: http://t.co/wykbONfGbd
The second touching story was that of Mississippi State running back Josh Robinson. Josh grew up in Bogalusa, Louisiana, and was raised by his grandmother after his father disappeared from his life and his mother was in prison. Sadly, his grandmother died of a heart attack getting ready for church one morning in 2004, leaving Robinson without his caretaker. He bounced around between relatives’ and friends’ households before eventually living out of his car behind his high school football stadium. He said it seemed easy to fall into trouble in life, but he didn’t want to be a bad kid. After being offered a scholarship by Dan Mullen, he has now become a part of the Mississippi State family, and is incredibly close with the Mullen family. He now leads the SEC in rushing touchdowns. The full video can be found here: http://goo.gl/cVaJ7e
Sam Ponder made an appearance this week to interview Nick Saban. The highlight of this was video of Nick Saban dancing with his wife at an event. It is quite surreal to see him in such a human setting. Dancing was brought up because they previously aired a segment about coaches dancing in the locker room. I would describe it in detail here, but it just can’t be properly explained with words. I urge you to watch the video which can be found here: http://goo.gl/VGRYR2
Sam Ponder’s outfit of the week can be found below. Jennifer fell in love with the boots and vest. Around our house, this is not winter or the holiday season. It is “Samantha Ponder Winter Wear” season.

Quarterback guru George Whitfield was back this week, and continues to improve on his style (no doubt thanks to this blog). This week he was wearing a reasonably matching suit and tie, as well as “those damn brown shoes” as we call them around here. The main improvement this week was a slightly bigger jacket which allowed him increased range of movement when goofing off with Tom Rinaldi and Gene W. for a segment.

When it came time for this week’s big pick segment, our special guest picker was noted Sam Houston State alumnus Marcus Luttrell. I think he also wrote a book called “Lone Survivor” and it got turned in to a movie too. David Pollack started off the Gameday site picks by going with Alabama over the Bulldogs. During the finale, Luttrell played to the crowd by picking Alabama as well. Kirk and Desmond both went with the Tide as well. Corso took over at this point, reminding us that he lost his last two Alabama headgear picks. It seemed like he was going to pull the trigger and go with Mississippi State, but he faked us out and went with Alabama to win the big game. Charley the cat picked Alabama as well, so it is 100% unanimous from the panel that Alabama will be victorious. Enjoy the rest of your football evening.

