Phil Taylor's Sidelines

ARKANSAS HOOKS 'EM

The Arkansas-Texas rivalry has such a rich history that it's hard to believe that before last Saturday, the two teams hadn't met in the regular season since 1991. After the Razorbacks beat the No. 6 Longhorns 38-28 in Austin, Texas might wish it hadn't revived the matchup. "I'm the one who scheduled the game," Longhorns coach Mack Brown said. "So you don't have to look anywhere but here to place the blame."

Brown pushed for the home-and-home series largely because he wanted to honor legendary former coaches Darrell Royal of Texas and Frank Broyles of Arkansas. In the 1960s Broyles and Royal met in several games with the national championship in the balance, including the No. 1 Longhorns' 15-14 victory over the No. 2 Hogs in 1969, a battle that became known as the Game of the Century.

The Razorbacks celebrated Saturday's win by waving an Arkansas state flag on Texas's home field, exactly the kind of scene that Texas AD DeLoss Dodds had hoped to avoid. Dodds was leary about scheduling the game because he feared it would help the Hogs gain a recruiting foothold in Texas, but Brown and Royal helped persuade him.

MOTIVATIONAL MASTERMINDS

Georgia's 31-7 win over South Carolina was more than a key SEC matchup, it was a showdown between creative statistics keepers. Gamecocks coach Lou Holtz has added the category of "loafs" for his offensive linemen as a way of measuring their hustle. If a lineman is caught on the game tape walking downfield behind the ballcarrier, for instance, he is charged with a loaf.

In the coaches' meeting room at Georgia, Mark Richt keeps a board showing thermometers that display the number of penalties incurred by position. The idea is to motivate each assistant to make sure his unit doesn't have the highest reading. The final score on Saturday suggests that Richt's idea is more effective. Although the Bulldogs were flagged eight times for 68 yards (compared with South Carolina's seven times for 71 yards), the Gamecocks were called for the most crucial penalty, a holding call that negated a 27-yard TD pass in the second quarter.

FACES IN THE GAME

Name: Tom Ables

Age: 77