22 College Football Thoughts for 2022, No. 20: It’s amazing that this is still a debate in any way, but the SEC is awesome at college football.
22 College Football Thoughts For 2022
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22 College Football Thoughts For 2022
22. College football is changing, and it’s okay
21, Texas & Oklahoma, you really want the SEC?
20. The SEC is great at college football whether you like it or not
I know, I know, the SEC took a hit in the last bowl season.
Missouri lost to Army, Florida lost to UCF, Auburn fell to Houston, Mississippi State got rocked by Texas Tech, Tennessee lost an overtime thriller to Purdue, Ole Miss and LSU were blasted in their respective games, and Texas A&M had to tap out of its bowl because of COVID issues combined with a ton of personnel losses.
And oh how did social media laugh, and laugh, and laugh …
And laugh.
Forgetting for a moment that most of those teams were missing a ton of key parts to the transfer portal or the NFL Draft process – LSU was barely able to field a team in the sad loss to Kansas State – it’s a bad look when the supposedly invincible conference catches a beating from the rest of college football.
And then Georgia beat Alabama in the College Football Playoff National Championship.
I get accused of having a thing for the SEC, but I have no dog in this fight whatsoever.
I love all 131 college football programs equally – fine, so I give some a pony for Christmas and others a $5 Red Lobster gift card – but let 2022 be the year we stop with any semblance of “SEC is overrated” banter any time one of its member programs stubs its toe.
I wish it wasn’t like this. I wish the Pac-12 would rise up and be awesome, and I wish the ACC could come up with stronger teams 1-through-14 this year – and eventually add Notre Dame full-time.
I wish all the leagues would rock. I wish there was a better disparity of NFL-level talent across the other conferences, but the SEC is the SEC, and it’s about to get even bigger, better, and stronger in the coming years.
Don’t assume that it’s a good thing.
For most die-hard SEC fans, life in the conference is a miserable existence – either you win the national title, or your season was a disaster.
For almost anyone else, doing what Alabama did in 2021 – with an SEC Championship and College Football Playoff National Championship appearance – would be legendary. Alabama fans act like last year was a failure – which it most certainly wasn’t.
You can’t lose in this league, and if you do, you can’t have a bad few weeks or a sizable chunk of the fans are going to want the coach gone, more top players through recruiting and the transfer portal, and an overhaul of the program from top to bottom.
But it’s just that kind of unrealistic insanity that ups everyone’s game.
You can put together a whopper of a top ten recruiting haul and still not finish in the top five of SEC classes.
You can get a top shelf head coach, and he’s still going to be among the guys you recognize with one name, like Nick, and Leach, and Jimbo, and Kelly, and Lane, and Kirby.
Your league might have a ton of NFL guys, but will it take up 25% of the draft like the SEC will?
Your league might have a national title contender or two, but does it have six programs that won 14 of the last 24 national titles and 12 of the last 16?
Let the SEC do what it does, and please don’t get so offended when anyone points out just how good the conference is. More to the point, if you’re not an SEC fan, you’re probably better off.
You probably lead a fuller, richer, happier existence with a ten-win season seen as a positive.
There’s fun to be had all across the rest of the college football landscape without the SEC’s whack-job intensity.
Seriously, you want excitement? You want a fan base that’s out-of-its-mind jacked? Welcome to …
(Up Next: The new member of the FBS world)
22 College Football Thoughts For 2022
22. College football is changing, and it’s okay
21, Texas & Oklahoma, you really want the SEC?
