Going Out On A Limb: SEC Edition

Football is king in SEC Country, and the SEC is king of football. The conference accounts for the last six BCS champions, won by four different programs. That the title have been distributed among multiple teams makes the feat that much more impressive, because it’s indicative of just how good the entire league is.

They just play a different brand of football down South. Defensive players are faster, yet more physically imposing. That’s the key to SEC dominance. Just look at the 2011 BCS Championship. Though Oregon contained Auburn’s explosive offense, the Tiger defense was able to do just a little more in bottling up the fastest offense in college football history. It was truly a sight to behold, and the foremost example of what separates the SEC from its counterparts.

But a conference can have so many different, high quality teams for so long without them beginning to trip one another up. Predicting the SEC to get shut out of the BCS isn’t going out on a limb — it’s a relatively en vogue projection this offseason. There are five legitimate top 10 teams in the conference poised to knock one another off, as well as lurking underdogs with high upset potential any given Saturday, whether it be Florida, Mississippi State, Auburn or newcomers Missouri and Texas A&M.

Conversely, picking an SEC team to reach and win the BCS championship isn’t going out on a limb. Maybe betting on black at the roulette table in Las Vegas seven consecutive times is out there, but the SEC’s titles were not accrued through mere chance. But imagine the look friends might have given you in the summer of 2010 had you projected Auburn to run the table, including defeating reigning champion Alabama in Tuscaloosa, and win the national championship.

Sure, the Tigers’ win to wrap up the ’09 campaign against Northwestern in the Outback Bowl was impressive, but the next year’s AU squad was an unknown. Even after knocking off Mississippi State early in the campaign, AU’s prognosis for breaking out on the national stage was mostly considered for 2011. Of course, Cam Newton put on a Green Lantern ring and became an intergalactic football force on his way to the Heisman, Nick Fairley decimated opposing offensive lines, Danny Sheridan talked about bag men and the rest is history.

Going out on a limb in the SEC is difficult. Alabama, LSU and Arkansas are all bonafide championship caliber squads. They could cannibalize each other’s title aspirations, but any of the three could play for the national championship. The SEC East has taken a back seat to its western counterpart in recent years, but both Georgia and South Carolina grace the preseason top 12. That’s hardly a long jump to No. 1 by November. You have to keep digging to find an out there BCS championship projection.

Because there is not one, but three heavyweights in the West you can discount any of the division’s other four teams. This series is about the unlikely, not the impossible. While A&M, Auburn and Mississippi State all have potential for an upset in them, to ask anything more would be ludicrous. South Carolina and Georgia, on the other hand, can be had.

Florida is a popular pick to make some noise. The Gators have a track record of success, and return a stellar defensive group. However, the offensive question marks are too much to overlook. Tennessee has one of the SEC’s best quarterbacks in Tyler Bray, but he won’t be throwing to his No. 1 receiver, Da’Rick Rogers. Moreover, the Volunteer running game is putrid.

I like what James Franklin is doing at Vanderbilt, but the Commodores aren’t at a level to compete for the SEC East yet. And Kentucky…can Anthony Davis throw a spiral?

That leaves Missouri. Yes, Missouri.

Imagine the uproar a Big 12 team — and not just a Big 12 team, but one that finished in the middle of the pack a season ago — coming in and winning the SEC East. It’s a tall order, no question. The Tigers draw Alabama out of division, albeit in Columbia where MU sold tickets at a record pace this offseason. Columbia is also home to the Tigers’ SEC debut against Georgia, the division’s presumptive favorite.

The Tigers must leave the Show Me State for match-ups with South Carolina (in the conference’s original Columbia), Tennessee and Florida and it’s on the road where [WARNING: INCOMING PUN] the Tigers will show me something.