THE BIG STORY

Georgia redshirt freshman running back Knowshon Moreno will get his first start as a Bulldog Saturday against Vanderbilt in place of Thomas Brown, who is out for at least a month with a broken collarbone, Bulldogs’ running backs coach Tony Ball said.

Moreno (right) leads Georgia with 462 yards rushing on a team-high 91 carries with three touchdowns and is 10th in the SEC in rushing.

“When you’re on the field, you’re a starter,” Ball said. “That’s the thing I’ve always told him. It doesn’t matter who started the game. Whether he’s out there the first play or the 10th play, you’re the starter when you’re out there. He is ready,” running backs coach Tony Ball said Tuesday night. “He understands.”

Senior Kregg Lumpkin, coming back from a broken right thumb, will share the workload, coach Mark Richt said. Each tailback should get around 15 carries. Lumpkin “hasn’t quite had the pounding that a lot of the other backs get,” Richt said. “I see a fresh Kregg Lumpkin right now and I think he’ll help us.”

A look at the league:

ALABAMA

Alabama’s special teams have worked this week on a practice field with artificial turf, due to the field turf at Ole Miss. Unless the Tide makes the SEC Championship Game at Atlanta’s Georgia Dome, Saturday’s game will be the only one during Alabama’s regular season not played on natural grass. “It won’t be that big of an adjustment,” said safety Rashad Johnson, noting that the Tide has practiced each Thursday on its artificial field. . .Middle linebacker Prince Hall remained with the first-string defense Tuesday ahead of leading tackler Rolando McClain. “I’m starting right now,” Hall said, “but you never know.” Cornerback Lionel Mitchell was in the Tide’s first-string secondary ahead of Marquis Johnson, who was with the second unit. Kareem Jackson and Simeon Castille were the other two cornerbacks in Alabama’s nickel package. End Brandon Deaderick remained with the starting defensive line ahead of Bobby Greenwood, who is recovering from a left ankle sprain. On offense, tailback Glen Coffee continued to work with the starters.

ARKANSAS

For the first time in a while, Arkansas had wide receivers Robert Johnson and Marcus Monk dressed in shoulder pads, going through practice as usual. That doesn’t mean that both seniors will be healthy enough to play Saturday night against No. 22 Auburn. Johnson was bothered last week by a severe muscle strain in his lower right leg. But he didn’t show any signs of discomfort during the first part of Tuesday’s practice. The wide receiver, who was held out of last Saturday’s 34-15 win over Tennessee-Chattanooga, had no problems jogging and running through a rope ladder early in practice. He also didn’t walk with a noticeable limp like last week. Despite missing last Saturday’s victory with the leg injury, Johnson is listed on Arkansas’ depth chart as the starting flanker against Auburn. The sight of Monk practicing in shoulder pads was even more surprising. The senior, who is still rehabbing from his second arthroscopic surgery on his right knee, has participated in practice this season. But he usually wears just a T-shirt and shorts. Monk appeared to have no trouble, though, going through a drill in a T-shirt, shoulder pads and shorts on Tuesday afternoon. He also had his right knee wrapped, but it wasn’t a full brace as usual. “He’s a little bit better this week than he was last week,” Arkanas coach Houston Nutt said. “Does that mean he’s going to play (Saturday)? Probably not, but (he’s) getting closer. It’s a good feeling just to see him with pads on.”

AUBURN

Auburn could be missing as many as five starters in Saturday’s game at Arkansas, coach Tommy Tuberville said Tuesday. Three players — linebacker Merrill Johnson (shoulder), safety Aairon Savage (knee) and center Jason Bosley (knee) — did not practice Tuesday, while linebacker Tray Blackmon (ankle) and defensive end Quentin Groves (dislocated toes) practiced at only “50 percent,” Tuberville said. Auburn did not allow any of the injured players to speak to the media this week, and all practices are closed, so Tuberville was the sole bearer of injury news Tuesday. We’re becoming a good defense, although we still don’t have a lot of our guys out on the field,” Tuberville said. “It’s one of those things where we need to get as many of those people back as we can. We’ll have to wait and see Saturday. We’re still in a situation now where we’re going to have to depend on a lot of younger players.” Groves “can’t push off” and “doesn’t have any strength in his foot,” Tuberville reported. “I wouldn’t count on any of those guys being starters, because they can’t get enough full-speed reps,” Tuberville said. “If they were needed in terms of depth, they might be able to give you a few plays like Tray did against Florida. All those guys are in about the same situation.”

FLORIDA

Florida quarterback Tim Tebow downplayed receiving hundreds of threatening messages left on his cell phone last week, presumably from LSU fans. “It was an interesting experience handling it all,’’ Tebow said. “But it wasn’t too much.” According to Tebow, LSU fans began lighting up his cell phone early last week, leaving harassing and sometimes physically threatening, voice and text messages on his cell phone. “Some people did take it way too far, farther than you should take it with sports,” Tebow said. “For the most part, people are just having fun. There are people like that everywhere.” Tebow said he was forced to listen to the voice messages on his phone in order to delete them. Asked to describe some of the messages, Tebow said, “I really don’t use that type of language too much.”

GEORGIA

The critical self-evaluation of the Tennessee loss didn’t stop with the players. “We definitely got outcoached and got outplayed,” Georgia coach Mark Richt said on his radio show Monday night. “I did a poor job. For whatever reason, I didn’t do a good enough job to help this team get prepared like they ought to be and when adversity struck, we did not show enough fight.” Richt pointed out Tennessee had a “sky is falling” mindset before the Volunteers beat Georgia 35-14. “It’s natural for the fans to get emotional,” Richt said. “I don’t blame them for being bummed out. That was a bummer of a game, man.”

KENTUCKY

Lexington has about 7,400 hotel rooms, but finding one vacant this weekend will be next to impossible.
The Keeneland fall meet, the University of Kentucky-Louisiana State University football game, UK’s Big Blue Madness and several smaller events are all converging this weekend, sending out-of-towners to Frankfort, Georgetown and other surrounding cities for accommodations. The Lexington Convention and Visitors Bureau, which monitors hotel availability, has heard from 27 local hotels that have said they are booked up this weekend. The organization had a list of 11 Lexington hotels that said last week that they had vacancies for this weekend. But as of Monday, only two of them said they still had rooms. Managers at several hotels in Frankfort, Nicholasville and Georgetown said they were booked up this weekend, too. “People usually don’t have trouble getting rooms here,” said Scott Stricklin, associate athletic director for UK.

LSU

LSU closed practice Tuesday afternoon. So it is not known if or how much injured wide receiver Early Doucet practiced. Doucet has missed LSU’s last four games with a groin injury. Miles sounded Monday like Doucet would play Saturday when the No. 1 Tigers (6-0) play at No. 17 Kentucky (5-1) in a 2:30 p.m. CBS game. “I am optimistic that he can take some snaps,” LSU coach Les Miles said. “I don’t know if I’m overly or cautiously optimistic. I know that this week is an important week for him at practice. We’ll have to see how it goes. I’d like to think that he’d be dressed out and have an opportunity this Saturday.”

OLE MISS

Ole Miss coach Ed Orgeron tried his best to keep Alabama running back Terry Grant in his home state. In the end, Orgeron couldn’t even get Grant to The Grove. “We never could get him to visit, and we really wanted to recruit him because of his speed,” Orgeron said. “We thought he was a fantastic player.” Grant, of course, signed with Alabama out of Lumberton, Miss., and started this season’s first five games as a redshirt freshman. He is one of six Mississippi natives on Alabama’s roster, including receiver Mike McCoy and reserve tailback Jimmy Johns. “He’s a loud guy if you’ve ever met him,” Grant said of Orgeron. “I had a feel of where I wanted to be. I just kind of felt that wasn’t the place for me.”

MISS. STATE

Mississippi State tailback Anthony Dixon said he has the same attitude as he had last week, but also said he’s more “focused” heading into Saturday’s game against No. 25 Tennessee. A week ago, that wasn’t a given. His coach, Sylvester Croom, criticized him and demoted him to No. 2 on the depth chart. He responded with career highs in carries, rushing yards and touchdowns in MSU’s 30-13 win over UAB. But he’s not satisfied this week, not until he breaks free of the line of scrimmage. “I was kinda angry at myself because I wanted to break a big run and I haven’t gotten my big run yet,” Dixon told the Jackson Clarion-Ledger. “This game, I’m going to be looking for it. I’m going to be running hard trying to get my big run because I’m hurting for one.”

SOUTH CAROLINA

Had North Carolina not beaten Miami in 2004 to save John Bunting’s job, Steve Spurrier might have found himself on the other side of this week’s clash of the Carolinas. Spurrier said Tuesday that a North Carolina booster contacted him in 2004 during his year off after leaving the Washington Redskins. There was rampant speculation in ‘04 about Bunting’s future in Chapel Hill after the Tar Heels were trounced by Utah in mid-October to fall to 3-4. But UNC bounced back to defeat No. 4 Miami 31-28 two weeks later, leading to a berth in the Continental Tire Bowl and a contract extension for Bunting. He lasted two more seasons before being fired last year with a 27-45 record in six seasons. Meanwhile, former South Carolina athletics director Mike McGee worked quickly to snare Spurrier to succeed Lou Holtz at the end of the ‘04 season. “Coaching, where you coach, is all timing,” Spurrier said. “Who knows what would have happened if that job was open when I was free and available?” Spurrier said UNC would have been a “wonderful place” to coach. “The place has got a lot of resources, just like here. For some reason, they have not done all that great there,” he said. “But the reason I’m here — I was available when this one opened up.”

TENNESSEE

Senior wide receiver/holder Casey Woods, a native of Starkville, Miss., is looking forward to making the trip for Saturday’s game. But some of his teammates aren’t. “There’s a bunch of guys that don’t know much about Starkville that are, ‘Oh, my gosh, Starkville?’” said Woods, son of former Mississippi State offensive coordinator Sparky Woods. “Just the name Starkville makes everyone think, ‘Good God,’ you know?”

VANDERBILT

Earl Bennett has moved within striking distance of the Southeastern Conference’s all-time receptions mark, needing seven catches to move past Kentucky’s Craig Yeast at the top of the league charts. “I think it’s a monumental achievement, in two-and-a-half years,” Vanderbilt Coach Bobby Johnson said regarding the junior receiver, who has compiled 202 catches in just 28 games — an average of 7.2 per contest. “I think it’s extremely tough, if you look at the list of those ahead of him and those he’s passed.”