Auburn @ South Carolina preview
Georgia Dome
Last Meeting ( Sep 25, 2010 ) South Carolina 27, Auburn 35
The off-field concerns have been laid to rest, at least for now. But the Auburn Tigers still have some business to tend to on the field.
The Tigers learned Wednesday that star quarterback and presumed Heisman Trophy front-runner Cam Newton is eligible for Saturday's SEC Championship game, but to get to the national title game, Auburn still has to get past a South Carolina team that nearly ended its undefeated season back in September.
Auburn will shoot for its seventh SEC title Saturday at the Georgia Dome, while the 16th-ranked Gamecocks will play in their first SEC title game and look for only the second conference crown in the football program's 117-year history.
A day after Auburn declared Newton ineligible, an NCAA release Wednesday reinstated him despite a "violation of amateurism rules" in which Newton's father and the owner of a scouting service solicited payment in exchange for Newton's letter-of-intent to play football and attend college.
"In determining how a violation impacts a student-athlete's eligibility, we must consider the young person's responsibility. Based on the information available to the reinstatement staff at this time, we do not have sufficient evidence that Cam Newton or anyone from Auburn was aware of this activity, which led to his reinstatement," the NCAA said.
With that out of the way - for the time being, anyway - the Tigers can turn their focus to a Gamecocks team that gave them fits the first time around.
South Carolina held a 27-21 lead after three quarters before allowing Auburn to rally for a 35-27 victory Sept. 25 at Jordan-Hare Stadium. In that game, Gamecocks quarterback Stephen Garcia lost fumbles on consecutive possessions, spoiling a night in which he completed 15 of 21 passes for 235 yards and three touchdowns.
It wasn't the only time the Tigers have teetered on the brink of watching their national title hopes evaporate. They have four wins by three points or fewer and have trailed in eight of their 12 victories.
The Tigers (12-0) kept their title hopes alive - and nudged ahead of Oregon atop the BCS standings - by rallying from a 24-0 deficit for a 28-27 win at Alabama last Saturday.
The Gamecocks (9-3) have had their trouble stopping the pass - they allow 245.5 passing yards per game - but they'll be more concerned with stopping Auburn's powerful running game Saturday.
Despite leading the SEC with 93.2 rushing yards allowed per game, the Gamecocks were gashed for 334 yards on the ground in the first meeting. No other team rushed for more than 140 yards against South Carolina, and the Gamecocks held nine of their other 11 opponents under 100 yards on the ground.
Auburn ranks sixth in the nation in rushing offense (291.3 yards per game), seventh in scoring offense (41.6 points per game) and eighth in total offense (490.1 yards per game). The Tigers have topped 300 rushing yards against six consecutive SEC opponents.
Newton has been the catalyst for the offensive success. He is the first player in SEC history to pass for 2,000 yards and rush for 1,000 in the same season. He ranks 11th in the nation with 111.3 rushing yards per game and is second in the nation with 43 combined rushing and passing touchdowns - more than 69 of the other 119 Football Bowl Subdivision schools have scored as a team.
It's also a matchup of two of the top freshman running backs in the country in South Carolina's Marcus Lattimore and Auburn's Michael Dyer.
Lattimore ranks second among freshmen with 101.3 yards per game and is tied with Newton for the SEC lead with 19 touchdowns, but he will be put to the test against Auburn's run defense, which ranks 10th in the nation, allowing just 108 yards per game. The Tigers held Lattimore to 33 yards on 14 carries in the first meeting.
Dyer's 886 rushing yards are the sixth most in the nation among freshmen, and he already has topped Bo Jackson's Auburn freshman rushing record of 829 yards.
Auburn has won five straight against the Gamecocks and leads the all-time series 7-1-1.