It's hard to argue with Alabama head coach Nick Saban's opinion on a nine-game SEC schedule. (Marvin Gentry-USA TODAY Sports)
A nine-game conference schedule has been a hot topic of debate surrounding the SEC’s spring meetings in Destin, Fla., this week — and for good reason. With so many changes taking place in college football, doing something logical seems downright idiotic nowadays.
Hey, let’s face it: college football has changed a lot over the last few years and more changes are coming. Longstanding rivalries like Texas/Texas A&M, Oklahoma/Nebraska and Kansas/Missouri are no more. And conference rivalries all over the country are being hit hard due to realignment.
In addition, the BCS era will come to a screeching halt in favor of a four-team playoff starting next season. The WAC (really, who cares?) doesn’t exist anymore. The Big Ten is adding new teams and changing those hideous division names, and the Big 12, which is home to traditional powers UT and OU, doesn’t even have a championship game. Not to mention that the Big East is now the American Athletic Conference (were the same guys that named this league related to the Big Ten Leaders and Legends visionaries?).
But getting back to the nine-game league slate, I’ll take the side of Alabama coach Nick Saban, who has been one of the only SEC coaches in favor of playing one more conference game a year the last couple of years. Yes, it will make it a more difficult for a team to go undefeated or win a title by playing another tough opponent, but due to the strength of the teams in the league all that should work itself out (the league hasn’t won seven straight titles by playing cupcakes).
“I’m absolutely in the minority, no question about it,” Saban said. “If you look at it through a straw and how it affects you and you are self-absorbed about it, nobody’s going to be for it. I shouldn’t be for it. We have a better chance to be successful if we don’t do it. But I think it’s best for the game and the league.”
Not only would a nine-game schedule allow more opportunities for teams competing for a league title to bolster their strength of schedule due to the rugged nature of the SEC, but it could open up more possibilities of creating new rivalries within the league while also giving fans a chance to watch more competitive conference matchups rather than games against FCS or poor out-of-conference opponents.
Sure, fans will always show up and support their teams, especially in the best conference in the land. But going to a Alabama/North Texas game or a Florida/Georgia Southern game is far less appealing than going to a Alabama/South Carolina game or a Florida/LSU game. And with the introduction of HDTV and the recent economic downturn, sometimes fans just want to watch the games within the confines of their own home.
“One of these days they (fans) are going to quit coming to games,” Saban predicted. “Everyone is going to say, ‘Why aren’t you coming to the games?’ Well, if you play somebody good, they’ll come to the games.”
The old-age idiom “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” doesn’t apply in college football anymore. Too many changes in such a short time have left a lot of college football fans, including myself, wondering when it will all stop and how will all this newness affect the sport’s basic fabric: rivalries and traditions.
Hey, I’m all in favor of making sure a call on the field is right and tougher schedules for all teams, whether that’s in the SEC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, ACC, MW or the AAC. But I am not a fan of eliminating some of the most storied rivalries in college football (like the aforementioned group and potentially Alabama/Tennessee and Auburn/Georgia from my area of the country), shuffling teams to new conferences every year and changing rules on a yearly basis. That’s a croc.
Football is a violent game. It’s a game where competitive spirit matters. And rivalry games and hard-nosed conference matchups bring out the best in the players on the field. Those games are also the ones that make us as fans bite our nails when the game is tied late in the fourth quarter — and with a lot on the line. And for goodness sakes, they don’t need to be taken away now.
SEC, do what’s right. Go to the nine-game league slate. But keep the rivalries that have made the best conference in America so special by allowing the schools the flexibility to maintain which teams they want to permantly remain on their schedules. It would be a crying shame if ya didn’t.
