The SEC is loaded with very good teams. Though there are some favourites in each division in Alabama and Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, Texas A&M and LSU should all be good this season and one upset could easily shake things up from the expected path.
In the ever-growing movement of college football – whether you look at TV dollars, conference re-alignment or points on the scoreboard – 2013-14 promises to be another enthralling season in the race for BCS hardware. .
The Southeastern Conference has won the last six BCS national titles and this year should be no exception with three teams in Bovada’s top-seven favorites to win this season’s championship. The following is a look at the top contenders in the conference along with their current odds to take home this year’s SEC title.
The Vanderbilt football program has a similar – though more emphasized – problem that Notre Dame and Stanford encounters; its high academic standards put it out of the contest on some top recruits.
Kentucky has gained somewhat of a reputation in recent years for being a scrappy, hard-luck program that plays the role of spoiler for the bigger bullies in the SEC. Indeed, Kentucky often plays up to its competition and is usually only a couple upsets away from a bowl game.
With the arrival of Mizzou to the SEC (along with Texas A&M this season) a third team with the “Tigers” nickname is added to the conference fray. Missouri hopes to distinguish itself far more than its mascot, however.
Auburn fans weren’t thrilled when Gene Chizik, then from Iowa State, was hired to replace Tommy Tuberville, but Chizik has done an excellent job with the Tigers. He delivered the program’s second national title in 2010, its first since 1957.
Ah, the Tennessee Volunteers. The Vols. The Sherbet and White. Rocky Top. What a wild ride UT has had over the past few seasons – and what an interesting case study the Vols make! A few years ago, head coach Phil Fulmer was an institution in Knoxville, owning a career 152-52 record as Tennessee coach.
In comes former Arkansas State head coach Hugh Freeze to try and fix the mess in Oxford, Mississippi.
Last year was Houston Nutt’s final chance holding the clipboard at Ole Miss, and once it was announced that Nutt wouldn’t be back, the Rebs got crushed in three consecutive games, including embarrassing losses to LSU (52-3) and – even more shamefully – to in-state rival Mississippi State, 31-3 in the Egg Bowl.
South Carolina was knocking on the door for a long time, with a good-but-unspectacular SEC East team under “the Ole Ball Coach” Steve Spurrier.
Last season saw the Gamecocks kick the door in, with an 11-win season that included victories over Florida, Georgia and Tennessee (for the second straight year, actually) and a drubbing of #21 Nebraska in the Capital One Bowl.
While it is a tragedy to college football fans that the storied Texas-Texas A&M rivalry has come to a close, there will be plenty of excitement around College Station in 2012 with A&M’s move to the SEC. The Aggies will play in the West division; they move to a conference and division that – with all due respect to Texas, Oklahoma and Oklahoma State – is more ferocious than the Big 12.
MSU head coach Dan Mullen has already been a miracle-worker, without even scraping near a BCS bowl; he has made the Bulldogs relevant in the suffocating SEC West division and has re-energized a fanbase that was sorely in need of it.
The boys from Baton Rouge had a flawless 2011 season before rival Alabama shut them out in the BCS title game, 21-0. For the balance of the campaign, LSU had a defense that might have been the only unit more imposing than Alabama’s.
The Hogs have really taken a step forward in the last several seasons, but this off-season has been shrouded in controversy (not unlike many other scenarios in the world of college football). The lying and sex scandal that precipitated the firing of head coach Bobby Petrino should hopefully not affect the product on the field in Fayetteville in 2012, but who knows? At the very least, Arkansas could miss Petrino’s aggressive play-calling.
The Gators, long an SEC powerhouse, must rebound from a disappointing 2011 season. Until 2010, Florida (under former head coach Urban Meyer) made appearing in BCS bowls its calling card, winning a national title in ’08 against Oklahoma and a Sugar Bowl in ’09 versus upstart Cincinnati.
Head coach Nick Saban has fielded a lethal football squad in Dixieland since his arrival six years ago. The Tide had a Sugar Bowl appearance in 2008, followed by National Titles in ’09 and last season. While taskmaster Saban must replace a considerable amount of NFL-bound talent in 2012, this team is deeper and more talented than most, and is poised for another great season in the SEC West division.
