NEW ORLEANS, La. — In the waning moments of the Sugar Bowl, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey walked off the field wearing a serious expression. Glum, some might say. Fully aware the takes and narratives being unspooled that very minute, as another one of his teams, this one conference champion Georgia, was ousted by another non-SEC team.
The mighty have fallen. The SEC’s reign is over. Let the world outside the South rejoice in anti-Dixieland delight.
Some of it may be overboard, dancing on the grave of a not-dead patient by SEC haters who finally see their chance. Some of it is a chance to vent back at the loud pro-SEC voices, at ESPN and elsewhere. And a lot of this may be premature. New arrival Texas could still bring the SEC its sixth national title in eight years.
But right now, it sure does look like the anti-SEC revelers have a point.
Georgia lost soundly to Notre Dame, a program that used to fall flat on the big stage against SEC teams and honorary SEC team Clemson. Meanwhile, the Longhorns needed two overtimes to beat Arizona State, which was supposed to be a pushover. Texas is now a clear underdog to Ohio State, which ran off Tennessee, the only other SEC team to make the field, in the first round.
Alabama, which many members of the SEC media apparatus argued should have gotten in, lost this week to Michigan. South Carolina, which also received a late push for inclusion, lost to Illinois. At least Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin saved some face by beating Duke on Thursday night. Sankey can send him a fruit basket.
But this is also not a one-year blip. The SEC didn’t make the national championship game last year. Alabama went to overtime with Michigan in the Rose Bowl CFP semifinal, but it did ultimately lose. And if the SEC is absent from the title game two years in a row, it really does mean … well, you know.
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Sankey, to be fair, sort of did this to himself.
A major goal of Playoff expansion was to stop college football from becoming a regional sport. It’s no accident that much of the complaining since has seemed to come from the South. Down here, many didn’t think anything was wrong with the four-team Playoff. Or even the BCS. The comparison has been made to NASCAR’s efforts to go national, but that totally misses the point.
NASCAR was a mostly regional sport that made changes and began to lose its soul in the process, without realizing its national dreams. College football was the opposite, a more national sport that was becoming more regional as Alabama, Clemson, LSU and Georgia racked up national titles, often playing each other in the national championship. Realizing this was doing harm — or at least leaving money on the table — Sankey and two commissioner counterparts, along with Notre Dame’s then-athletic director, devised a plan for Playoff expansion, which they figured would at least keep fan bases in the West and North engaged because their teams at least were assured certain spots in the field.
But those teams are doing more than just getting in, they’re knocking the SEC off its pedestal. And it’s happening in conjunction with the other big changes in the sport, which lead to their own natural conclusions.
If you believe that SEC programs long have, ahem, procured talent via ways that used to be against NCAA rules, then you may believe the ability for everyone to pay players has leveled the field. Whether or not that makes assumptions, or includes some naivete about how some non-SEC teams acquired talent in those times, it skirts another point.
The SEC is still signing the top players. In the high school recruiting Class of 2024, 25 of the 37 five-stars in the 247Sports Composite went to SEC schools, but that was split among 10 different SEC schools. In this year’s class it was 16 of the 24 consensus five-stars, with nine different SEC schools getting them. In the 2021 signing class, the last of the era before name, image and likeness restrictions were removed, the SEC signed only 16 of the 35 consensus five-stars, split among only five schools, with Alabama getting seven and Georgia getting four. (Texas and Oklahoma are not included in that total from 2021 and are in 2024-25, but for the record, each only had one of those other five-stars in 2021.)
It’s harder to hoard all the talent. Thanks to the removal of transfer restrictions, Alabama and Georgia can no longer stash blue-chip players on special teams and the scout team, let them develop a few years and then spring them on the world. They still can occasionally, but guys want to play, and depth takes a hit.
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The portal acquisition market is another dynamic, allowing players to get better quicker, both inside and outside the SEC. Ole Miss built its transfer-laden roster at the expense of Florida, Texas A&M, South Carolina and Alabama. They also compete for each other for non-SEC talent, with Auburn beating out Georgia for Eric Singleton Jr., a dynamic receiver from Georgia Tech.
But it’s non-SEC teams, desperate to return to glory, that are leveling the field even more. Ohio State beat out Georgia last year for Caleb Downs after the star safety left Alabama. Dylan Raiola could have been Georgia’s replacement quarterback in the Sugar Bowl, but he elected to go start as a freshman at Nebraska. This year the Cornhuskers also beat out Georgia for portal receiver Dane Key, who left Kentucky.
NIL and the transfer portal have been the great equalizer. But reports of the SEC’s demise would be premature.
This region still has the deepest reservoir of passionate fans, including rich boosters who will see their beloved teams falling behind and come to the rescue. That’s been an underrated story of the early NIL era, that collectives at programs that historically recruit well have had a tough time raising money because their fan base hasn’t seen the need.
Well guess what, apparently there’s a need.
This is all ultimately good for the sport. Four name brands in the semifinals, only one from the South, and not the part of the South that has dominated for the last decade-plus. The other three are from adjoining states, yes, but the quarterfinals involved three teams from the West and one from the South. This expansion is accomplishing one of its goals, keeping all regions of the country interested in meaningful college football long past the point they used to be.
It’s good for college football. Not so much for SEC football. But it’s also a wake-up call. The conference can still be the best in college football. It will just have to go back to earning it.
(Photo: Chris Graythen / Getty Images)
