Whether fans outside the SEC like it or not, those in the position to orchestrate such things in college football have decreed an LSU and Alabama rematch for the BCS National Championship on January 9, 2012.
An all-SEC National Championship game coupled with the fact that an SEC team has been crowned the BCS National Champion each of the previous five seasons has national sports network talking heads crowing yet again about the superiority of the SEC.
From top to bottom, college football fans are told each week by the self-appointed "experts", the SEC is the country's strongest conference. But is the SEC really superior to all eleven of the other NCAA FBS (Division 1-A) conferences? There may be the ring of truth in Mark Twain's oft-quoted observation; "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics." Nevertheless an objective examination of the cold, impersonal, unbiased statistical records of SEC teams at season's end suggest that the irrationally exuberant tale of SEC superiority in college football force fed to fans ad nauseam is really more myth than fact.
A Tale of Two Teams
In deference to the Tigers and the Tide, it is nearly impossible to dispute that LSU and Alabama were in fact the cream of the 2011 crop of FBS football squads. LSU finished the season with a perfect record. Alabama's lone defeat came at the hands of LSU in the November 5, 2011 regular season matchup between the two teams. Yet with scant exceptions, in balance 2011 produced a particularly mediocre crop of quality college football teams.
Teams that looked good on paper in the pre-season often failed to live up to expectations during the season. LSU and Alabama for the most part lived up to expectations and enjoyed the success that knowledgeable fans expected of them. Both teams, LSU in particular, benefited in the weekly polls with wins over teams that were considered much better at the time the games were played than they ultimately proved to be at the end of the season. Perhaps both teams stood a bit taller in the eyes of pollsters, sports commentators and fans due to the marked absence of any real comparable competition but it can't be denied that both were excellent teams, especially defensively.
No matter how good the Crimson Tide and LSU Tigers were in 2011, having two exceptional teams in one conference does not a top to bottom superior conference make. The overall 2011 records of all SEC teams bear that opinion out.
2011 SEC Combined Records
In 2011, the SEC was composed of two divisions of six teams each for a total of 12. Overall the conference amassed 91 wins and 55 losses for an overall winning percentage of 0.623 percent. If the records of LSU and Alabama, the two top SEC teams, were removed for analysis of the remainder of the SEC, the combined won-loss records would become 67 wins and 54 losses and would yield a winning percentage of just over 0.500 at 0.554 percent. Most people would consider a 0.500 record pretty mediocre.
Out of the 12 teams in the SEC only six (50 percent) ended the season with winning records: LSU (13-0), Alabama (11-1), Georgia (10-3), South Carolina (10-2), Arkansas (10-2), and Auburn (7-5).
Georgia did not play Alabama. Vanderbilt (6-6) did not play LSU. South Carolina did not play either Alabama or LSU. Based on the season results it is quite rational to assume that had the teams played both LSU and Alabama during the season, Georgia would likely have finished at 9-4 and South Carolina at 8-4. In addition, had Vanderbilt played both, the Commodores would likely have finished at 5-7 and then only five SEC teams (41 percent) would have finished 2011 with a winning record.
Looking at the SEC from top to bottom and comparing the conference to others without undue concentration on the successes of the two top teams suggests that the SEC is on the whole no better a conference than the Big East, Big Ten, Pac 12, or Mountain West and is actually not as strong as the Big 12 or ACC. The SEC is probably superior to the remaining FBS conferences but in some instances only marginally so.
Why it Matters
Everyone is of course entitled to his or her own opinion with regard to which football conference is best. Yet in the case of sports commentators and college football pollsters a belief in the mythical superiority of the SEC has arguably translated into a pro-SEC bias in the BCS poll. For someone who does not believe in coincidences, the LSU - Alabama rematch smells of system manipulation. That might be terrific for sports network television ratings and ad sales. It might be great for generating bowl ticket sales and revenues but it is not good for the institution of college football or fair to fans.
Larry Darter - Larry Darter is a freelance writer and published author with three books to his credit. He is a graduate of the Univ. of Central ...
