Loss of Shockey could sink Georgia

A simple scramble through the heart of Arkansas's defense on Saturday turned into a sprained left knee ligament for Georgia quarterback D.J. Shockley.

That's D.J. Shockley, as in the Southeastern Conference's total offense leader. Suddenly, the Bulldogs have gone from having a playmaker at quarterback in Shockley, to a caretaker in backup Joe Tereshinski III.

Tereshinski managed to guide his team through the rough spots in a 23-20 win over the Razorbacks. But now, he has to start Saturday against arch-rival Florida in Jacksonville.

"I don't want to do anything to make this team lose," Tereshinski said.

While that's not exactly a confident, encouraging attitude, Georgia coach Mark Richt is counting on the rest of the team to rally around Tereshinski.

"What is going to be important is how everybody else plays around him," Richt said. "If you protect him, he will have a chance to find some receivers. If we give him some type of running attack, it will help him."

Tereshinski was 5-of-9 for 91 yards and one interception in 2-/2 quarters against Arkansas. He was sacked twice, but set up a field goal with a 43-yard pass and threw a 17-yard pass to set up a touchdown.

Richt said that he called too conservative a game after Shockley went out, and promised he'll be more aggressive against Florida.

"Everything we've been doing this season is certainly not too hard (for Tereshinski) to comprehend," Richt said.

Shockley will be in a soft cast and on crutches this week. Georgia has an open date next week before playing Auburn on Nov. 12. Until then, Tereshinski will be backed up by redshirt freshman Blake Barnes.

Around The SEC: Should LSU win out, it will win any divisional tiebreakers against Alabama and Auburn because it will have beaten both teams to reach the SEC Championship Game in Atlanta. The LSU-Auburn winner has advanced to the SEC title game in four of the past five seasons, and LSU edged Auburn, 20-17, in overtime Saturday. "I like our position in the conference," LSU coach Les Miles said. "I like where we're at. If we do the things that we're capable of, take care of business and keep up our end, everything we want to play for this season we'll have an opportunity to play for."... After a tough 23-20 loss at Georgia on Saturday, Arkansas coach Houston Nutt finds himself and his team for the first time ever with a 0-4 SEC record and 2-5 overall. It is the Razorbacks' first 0-4 SEC start since 1996, two seasons before Nutt replaced Danny Ford as coach. "I never dreamed that we'd be 0-4 or 2-5, it's awful," Nutt said. "But we had a lot of fight (against Georgia.)" Four of Arkansas's losses have been to ranked teams. ... Vanderbilt quarterback Jay Cutler completed 27-of-a career high 48 passes for a career-best 339 yards in Saturday's loss at South Carolina. He became Vandy's career leader in pass completions (616), and he moved to 15th place all-time in the SEC for passing yardage. He slid past former Auburn quarterback Jason Campbell and former Arkansas quarterback Clint Stoerner. Cutler now has 7,626 career passing yards.

Bad Anniversary: What is it about the third or fourth Saturday in October for Ron Zook? Last year when he coached Florida, Mississippi State upset the 20th-ranked Gators 38-31 on Oct. 23, and Zook was told two days later he wouldn't be retained at the end of the season.

So on Saturday, a year later almost to the day (Oct. 22), Zook's Illinois team got destroyed at home by Penn State, 63-10, after trailing 56-3 at the half. Illinois led 3-0 before Penn State scored 63 straight points. Illinois has lost its first three Big Ten games by a combined 98 points.

"I'm about as low as I've been in a while," Zook said. "Eventually we'll get over this."