Armour: SEC's era of dominance is over
The gap has closed.
For more than a decade, the talk in college football heading into rivalry weekend was how much better the Southeastern Conference was than everyone else. How, if not for the SEC teams having to beat up on each other, the national title game – or quasi national title game in the BCS days – and other top bowls could be the ninth game on the conference schedule.
SEC schools won all but two of the national titles from 2003 to 2013, with the 2011 BCS championship game an all-conference affair between eventual champ Alabama and LSU. The conference was so stacked the SEC Championship may as well have been the title game some of those years. Five times it featured top-five matchups, including No. 1 vs. No. 2 in both 2008 and 2009.
These days, however, the SEC is – dare I say it? – meh. At best.
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With two weeks until the bowl pairings are announced, Alabama and Florida are the only SEC teams in the top 10. Compare that with the Big Ten and Big 12, which each have three.
It's not as if the rest of the SEC is lurking, either. Ole Miss (19) and Mississippi State (22) are the conference's only other teams in this week's Amway Coaches Poll.
Even the rivalry games, which normally challenge Thanksgiving for importance this week, are of little relevance outside the South. The most compelling is that Egg Bowl tilt between Ole Miss and Mississippi State.
Yawn.
The Iron Bowl, which ranks right up there with Packers-Bears and Yankees-Red Sox in terms of bitter rivalries, is a snoozer, too. Auburn is last in the SEC West, having won only two conference games – and one of those was against Kentucky.
Oh, and say Auburn does upset No. 2 Alabama. That just knocks the SEC down another notch.
A two-loss Alabama team isn't making the College Football Playoff. Sorry Crimson Tide fans, but it's not. Not without total meltdowns by Clemson, Iowa, Notre Dame, Oklahoma, Ohio State, Michigan State … should I keep going?
And if Alabama doesn't get in, no one from the SEC gets in.
Yes, that's right. For the first time since 2005, the SEC would finish the season without a single team among the top four.
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"The best way to say it, in college football but just in general, perception outgrows reality sometimes," Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz said. "Alabama had some outstanding teams in the last decade, no one's going to deny that.
"(But) there are good teams all over the country, that's been my observation."
Now, before all you folks in SEC country start howling, this sub-par season is not a reflection of how tough the conference is. There were signs a fall was coming last season, when Wisconsin stunned Auburn in the Outback Bowl. A few hours later, Ohio State bulldozed Alabama in the playoff semifinals.
For the first time in nine years, there would be no SEC team in the national title game.
The aftershocks have continued this season. Florida needed overtime last weekend to eke out the win against Florida Atlantic. Ole Miss lost to Memphis earlier in the year. Yes, Memphis. Don't feel bad if you didn't know the Tigers played football, I didn't either.
Georgia needed OT to beat Georgia Southern, which has been in the FBS for all of two seasons. Auburn trailed Jacksonville State with about 5 ½ minutes to go before pulling out the overtime win. Missouri managed all of nine points against UConn.
"There is a lot of parity in college football," Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio said. "There's great players and great coaching going on in every league."
After a run of dominance unrivaled in college football history, the SEC has come back to the pack. Or maybe the pack has chased down the SEC, emboldened by the knowledge that no one is infallible.
Either way, the dynasty has ended, as all dynasties do.