THE BIG STORY

Chris Nickson’s starting job as Vanderbilt’s quarterback is on the ropes.

Nickson has made 17 straight starts, but Vandy coach Bobby Johnson told the Tennessean on Sunday that Nickson will need a solid week of practice to hold off backup QB Mackenzi Adams.

“There’s a chance that we’ll look at making a change at quarterback,” Johnson said in the wake of Vanderbilt’s 35-7 loss at Auburn. “Looking and doing is two different things. That’s what practice is for. It allows them to demonstrate who’s got the best grasp of the game plan and who’s executing it the best. I think (Adams) will probably be getting more reps than he did last week. We’ll give him a better chance to win it.”

Nickson, who has completed 60 of 113 passes for 757 yards with six touchdowns and five interceptions this season, said he has not begun doubting himself. On Saturday, he completed 5-of-16 first-half passes for 38 yards before giving way to Adams.

“You’ve got to have confidence to play football, especially this position,” Nickson said. “A lot of guys aren’t pleased with the way things went (Saturday), but you’ve got to maintain your confidence and keep striving for your goals and that’s what we’re going to do.”

As Nickson prepares for the Bulldogs, Johnson said it is important for the quarterback to trust his abilities.

“I think he’s got to believe in himself,” he said. “I think he does, but he needs to go ahead and believe in what he’s seeing and what’s happening out there and go ahead and relax a little bit and just play like he can.”

Adams, meanwhile, completed four of nine second-half passes for 24 yards with an interception — though he did lead Vanderbilt’s one scoring drive.

“He did a good job most of the time getting us into the right play and making the right checks,” Johnson said. “I don’t think he was too hesitant. He went out there and played well. He’s a competitor and I think that showed. He got sacked one time and he just bounced right back up.”

A look at the league:

ALABAMA

Alabama coach Nick Saban isn’t playing around. He’s benching players week-to-week to get the best players on the field and create competition. Before Saturday’s 30-24 victory over Houston, he benched tailback Terry Grant and middle linebacker Rolando McClain. “I think everybody needs to understand, somebody doesn’t have to mess up for somebody else to play,” Saban said. “You understand? It’s called competition.” Prince Hall started ahead of McClain because he did a better job of learning a complex Houston offense. Glen Coffee replaced Grant on the first team, started strong and finished with a career-high 121 yards on 30 carries, the most for Alabama tailbacks this season. “Any one of us can get in there and run the ball 30 times,” Coffee said. “I just happened to be that person.” Grant entered on the Tide’s opening drive, but did not run the ball again after recovering his first-quarter fumble. He finished with three attempts for 12 yards, a steep drop for the offense’s leading rusher. “We intended to play Terry Grant more today,” Saban said Saturday. “We need to play him and get his production back to where it was earlier in the season, because he can be a very effective player for us. But he didn’t do anything wrong.”

ARKANSAS

Jerell Norton’s 45-yard punt return in the first quarter in Saturday’s win over Chattanooga was Arkansas’ longest in nearly four years. The last time the Razorbacks had a longer return was on Nov. 15, 2003, when former Hog Marvin Jackson returned a punt 73 yards for a touchdown in a 48-20 win against New Mexico State. Arkansas coach Houston Nutt said Norton’s performance — he averaged 12.4 yards on five returns — will help him keep the job. But he also scolded the cornerback for a second-half return when Norton dove to field a short punt and nearly lost the ball. “He did do some very good things,” Nutt said. “He caught the ball well. He made our longest run of the year, gives us a little hope back there. But there’s no way he can make that kind of decision. He can’t just be crazy and free lancer back there. You’ve got to be smart. Hopefully this week he’ll understand he can’t ever gamble with the ball like that.”

AUBURN

As Auburn heads to Arkansas this week on a three-game win streak, Auburn coach Tommy Tuberville said his team has been average so far. “I’d probably rate us a C or C-plus through our first six games,” Tuberville said. “You know more about your football team as the year goes on,” he said. “This is a young team that the coaches didn’t know much about — much less the players knowing each other. We’ve kind of grown together during the last month. We’re a long way from our potential, but I like the look of this team over the last few weeks. They’ve kept the momentum. I like the improvement. We’ve learned more about this team and the players have worked hard in practice to improve.” Auburn re-entered the polls Sunday after a three-week absence. The Tigers are ranked 22nd in The Associated Press poll and 25th in the USA Today coaches’ poll.

FLORIDA

Florida couldn’t hold a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter and was forced to accept a 28-24 defeat from No. 1 LSU before a wild record crowd of 92,910 at Tiger Stadium on Saturday. Despite the loss, Florida coach Urban Meyer said, “I do believe we’re a better football team than we were at the beginning of the year. We’ve got a bye week and then another tough game against Kentucky. We’ve got to get guys better. I think we prepared very well. I think we played a hell of a football game. I’m not disappointed with our preparation at all.” The loss dropped Florida to 4-2 and 2-2 in the SEC. “No one has any energy to say anything,” said true freshman cornerback Joe Haden, when asked to describe the mood in the UF locker room. “Everyone left their heart on the field. We played our hearts out and gave everything we had. It just didn’t fall the right way this time.” Added tailback Kestahn Moore, “We feel shocked they came back and beat us in the end. You’re always shocked when you lose in the end.”

GEORGIA

Georgia fell 12 spots in the Associated Press poll Sunday, a day after a loss that matched the most lopsided defeat in Bulldogs’ Mark Richt’s six and a half seasons. Richt met with both offensive and defensive coaches Sunday and said he anticipates “a few changes here and there” in the lineup, but not extensive personnel tinkering. “We’ve just got to get back to the basics,” safety Kelin Johnson said. “(The coaching staff) is going to deal with that this week and they’re going to make sure that we’re ready for Vanderbilt. That’s point blank.” The offensive line is an issue and so is the defense, which was scored on in four of Tennessee’s first five possessions. “We’ve got problems all the way from front to back,” Richt said. “We’ve got some issues. We’ve had some good play at times all across the board also. We’re just not playing consistently enough together. We’ll have one guy, two guys maybe make a mistake on any given play and it seems like a lot are on crucial third downs and then all of a sudden we can’t get them to punt.”

KENTUCKY

Kentucky Coach Rich Brooks knows he’ll have to quickly pick his team up off the ground after the Wildcats let one slip away in Thursday night’s 38-23 loss to South Carolina. UK outgained the Gamecocks 384-342 but were done in by four turnovers, including three by quarterback Andre Woodson. “I think everybody feels down in the dumps,” Brooks said. “But you can wallow in self pity for only so long.” UK had become a national story during its 5-0 start, and while Thursday’s loss will take some of the shine off, Brooks is maintaining a positive approach. “We’re 5-1,” Brooks said. “We’re in great position. We’re still in the battle. If you told the team that they’d be 5-1 after six games, maybe they’d be a little disappointed, but you know that’s a pretty good deal.”

LSU

LSU wide receiver Early Doucet will be making the trip to Lexington, Ky., for Saturday’s 2:30 p.m. CBS game against No. 17 Kentucky and there is a chance he could play, LSU coach Les Miles said Sunday. Doucet has not played nor dressed out since the second game of the season against Virginia Tech because of a freak groin injury suffered on Sept. 14 in a non-contact drill the day before the Middle Tennessee game. He only began practicing lightly last week. “I don’t know to what extent, but I’m cautiously optimistic that he’ll play in this next game,” Miles said. “We’re not going to push him, but he almost dressed out for this game. I would be certain that he would travel with us to Kentucky. I don’t know to what extent he’ll be ready to play until after this week.” Doucet, a senior from St. Martinville expected to be a first-round draft choice in the next NFL draft, caught 15 passes for 153 yards and two touchdowns in LSU’s first two games. Sophomore Brandon LaFell has tried to replace Doucet as LSU’s go-to receiver, but LaFell has dropped six passes in the last two games alone.

OLE MISS

Ole Miss cornerback Dustin Mouzon is making a habit of being in the right place at the right time, this time returning a blocked field goal 55 yards for a touchdown late in the Rebels’ 24-0 victory over Louisiana Tech on Saturday. Mouzon was one of the stars during the Rebels’ 23-21 victory over Memphis in the first week of the season after he returned an interception 99 yards for a touchdown. “Just do your assignment and things will come to you,” Mouzon said. “I just happened to be in the right place and took advantage. It was a team play.”

MISS. STATE

Adam Carlson’s missed extra point after Anthony Dixon’s first touchdown in the third quarter was his first missed point-after of the junior’s career. He had made his previous 47 prior to that. When Carlson’s kick sailed wide left, it also snapped MSU’s streak of 113 successful extra point attempts. Its last miss was on Sept. 14, 2002, when John Michael Marlin missed against Jacksonville State. . .Mississippi State received just one penalty for 15 yards Saturday, which met with Croom’s approval. The last two weeks, MSU had incurred nine flags in both games and entered the game with 40 penalties in five games.

SOUTH CAROLINA

South Carolina players woke up Sunday morning in sole possession of first place in the SEC East. By mid afternoon they had another reason to puff out their chests: the program’s first top-10 ranking in six years and its best poll position in more than two decades. USC cracked the top 10 of The Associated Press poll for the first time since 2001, climbing four spots to No. 7 following its 38-23 defeat of then-No. 8 Kentucky on Thursday. The Gamecocks started 5-0 in 2001 to reach No. 9 in the AP Poll before losing to Arkansas. USC has not been ranked as high as seventh since the 1984 Gator Bowl, when No. 7 USC fell to ninth-ranked Oklahoma State 21-14. USC, which began the season unranked, is ranked ahead of every SEC team except No. 1 LSU, which received all 65 first-place votes in the media balloting. The Tigers are the only team to beat the Gamecocks this year. USC jumped six spots to No. 12 in the USA Today coaches poll. “It’s nice, very nice. We appreciate it,” Gamecocks coach Steve Spurrier said. “Obviously, that’s good for our football program, for our university and all that. But we realize it’s almost exactly halfway through the season, six games. A lot can happen in the next six. We’re trying to win the division.” USC (5-1, 3-1 SEC) holds a one-game lead in the East. Florida and Georgia are 2-2 in conference play; Tennessee and Kentucky are 1-1. Following a non-conference game Saturday at North Carolina, the Gamecocks conclude their SEC schedule against Vanderbilt, No. 25 Tennessee, Arkansas and No. 13 Florida. “When we beat Georgia, we had a chance to be in the race as long as we beat everybody we’re supposed to. That’s all we’ve done right now. We’ve won the ones that we were supposed to win,” Spurrier said. “We’ve got some coming up that we’re not going to be favored, and we’re going to find out if we can win or not.”

TENNESSEE

Another Florida loss leaves Tennessee and South Carolina as the lone Eastern division teams in control of their own fate midway through the season. “It just puts us in a good position if we’re able to take advantage,” Tennessee coach Phillip Fulmer said. “I think everybody’s smart enough to understand that we’re in a good position, but we’ve got to take care of our business.” The Gamecocks, who lead the East at 3-1 in SEC play, come to Neyland Stadium on Oct. 27. But with two conference road trips between now and then, Fulmer isn’t even thinking beyond Saturday’s 2:30 p.m. EDT game at Mississippi State. “You’re going to say it’s a coaching cliche, but it’s true,” Fulmer said. “We have got to take it one game at a time, focus on ourselves and focus on being the best that we can be.”

VANDERBILT

Earl Bennett became Vanderbilt’s all-time receptions leader midway through the third quarter of Saturday’s 35-7 loss to Auburn. He caught a 7-yard pass from Mackenzi Adams to move ahead of Keith Edwards. “It’s good to break the record, but I’d rather have the win than the record any day,” said Bennett, who finished with four receptions for 31 yards and now has 202 career catches for 2,521 yards. “I just felt like we could never get anything rolling on offense. We didn’t execute throughout the game. We were given great plays; we didn’t execute.” Bennett, who now has two more receptions than Edwards compiled during the 1980, ‘82 and ‘83 seasons, needs seven catches to pass former Kentucky receiver Craig Yeast (1995-98) for the all-time Southeastern Conference record.