To listen to the pundits, you’d think acknowledging that the SEC is by far the best conference in college football is an idea that’s … oh-so 2010.
Think again.
With a couple of noted exceptions – Kentucky and Georgia come to mind –- the SEC proved again in Week 1 that it is the strongest top-to-bottom conference in the country.
To argue otherwise is misguided at best, foolish at worst.
The numbers prove this, both on the field and at the sports book. The SEC was 8-4 against the spread over the weekend, and the West particularly was strong at 5-1 (Auburn’s near-upset loss to Utah State was the lone loser).
I’m thinking if you placed 12 bets and cashed in eight of them, it would make for a happy Labor Day weekend.
Now, the idea that other conferences have improved surely has some merit, but to connect this notion as coinciding with some sort of decline in the SEC would be a mistake.
Sure, Ohio State had a nice win over Arkansas in the Sugar Bowl, Oregon was more than respectable in the BCS title game and Boise State just clobbered Georgia in Atlanta. I’ll give credit where it’s due.
Even so, a broader-picture view shows the SEC still sits atop college football’s perch. The conference has won five straight BCS titles and six of the last eight. The SEC has covered in each of the six wins and two of the clubs –- LSU in 2003 and Florida in 2007 -- did so as a touchdown underdog.
Granted, in last year’s bowl season, the SEC went 5-4-1 ATS, far below its usual cash-grabbing efficiency. However, in bowl games played Jan. 1 or later, the SEC was 5-2 ATS, suggesting that its strongest representatives played better than the best clubs other conferences had to offer.
It’s also worth noting that if the Arkansas kid who blocked the punt in the last minute of the Sugar Bowl, with no Ohio State players in the same zip code and nothing but an artificial-turf pasture between him and the end zone -– and literally nothing that could go wrong by trying to scoop it up even if he misses -– then that record would have been 6-1 ATS for the SEC. (Kentucky’s loss to Pitt in the Garbage Recycling Bowl on Jan. 8 was the only ATS loser for the SEC in this span).
Yes, I am still a little bitter about the bad beat from the Sugar Bowl, but most of the time when the SEC plays non-conference teams in bowl games or in the early season, I’m willing to take my chances with teams from the nation’s toughest conference.
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