2013 All-Conference, FotY, and The MHA.

Bama Secs of counsel, Joseph Oaks, esq., has just handed me a sealed envelope with the verified results.

Congratulations to the 2013 Bama Secs All-Conference Line:

Chris Browning (Alabama)
Greg Cousins (Tulane)
Brian Moore (Alabama)
Chris Partin (Southern Miss)
Dylan “Pickle” Schroeder (LSU)
Dylan “Sharon” Shannon (LSU)
Michael Venezia (Alabama)

The first thing I notice? Four people share a first name with someone else. Coincidence? You decide. And the second thing I notice is that one of those people is Southern Miss’ first first-teamer ever.

Also of note, there were almost as many legitimate ballots cast this year as in the two previous years combined. That makes the results in the next category particularly more compelling.

After 96 ballots, for the 2013 Freshman of the Year, there is a tie:

Evan Walter (Tulane)

Garrett Yetman (LSU)

And the 2013 Myron Hardy Award winner, as chosen by his peers, is…

The ballot is closed.

Anything time-stamped after 5pm CT will not be counted. Sorry.

Thanks for voting!

And here’s the 2013 ballot.

Votes will be accepted until Sunday, April 21st at 5pm CT. We will announce the results Sunday night.

Check out the previous post’s comments thread for player discussion.

Time to cast your ballots for real.

But of course, before we vote we must first endure the annual nomination campaign of hype and hyperbole!

You were on the field, so you tell us: Who played well? Who impacted games? Who was pivotal to a team’s success? Or to the other team’s suppression? Who impressed?

In short, who deserves an All-Conference nod, or even the 2013 MHA, and why?

The comments thread is yours.

Game-to-go Recap: Miss. State the last team in.

We’ll talk a lot in the coming days about Alabama’s current dominance over the rest of Gulf Coast, but what Bama Secs event would be complete without a Mississippi State trip to Regionals through the back door? It’s a streak that rivals any other in the conference. And fitting since even the bracket itself is named after their former grad year captain, Brad Jones.

Credit is due to Vanderbilt, a team in a rebuilding year and that no one expected much from this season. Brickhouse gave champion Alabama their closest contest of the tournament. But in the end, the land-grant institution from Mississippi was better prepared to prevail in the mud and slop that the fields had become by the last round. Darkhorse claims the final ticket to Tupelo, 15-6.

Alabama: 2013 Gulf Coast Conference Champs!

Alabama defeats LSU 15-7 in the championship game, extending their finals streak over LSU to 4 games in a row now.

Yellow Hammer remains the only Gulf Coast champion of Obama’s presidency, a fact that conflicts with the administration’s position on redistribution. Though as the conference’s elite team, Alabama will be asked to carry a larger share of the burden at Regionals.

More details on the game itself once Francis thaws out.

Meanwhile, in a rematch of the highly spectated 2008 game-to-go, a familiar Mississippi State faces a finally likable Vanderbilt. This is Mississippi State’s fourth trip to the Brad Jones Memorial Backdoor game-to-go. They are undefeated in all three previous appearances, having beaten Vanderbilt twice and Auburn once.

3v3 Recap.

The weather changed from wet and rainy to windy and cold as Mississippi State Darkhorse took the field against Southern Miss’ zone defense.

Southern Miss secures the 5th spot at Regionals.