And so, friends, it’s time to put another season to bed. Alabama won the national championship and the conference showed up to win most of its bowl games, but I think it’s a bit of a stretch to see the SEC as dominant as its been in certain recent seasons. Too many strange losses, too many underachievers… too few great quarterbacks to make that sort of assertion, at least in my humble opinion.
The tough part about doing a power poll after the bowl games is that motivation plays so much of a role in how most teams play in their bowls, so it’s not always a reflection on their underlying qualities. I’d like to think I’ve done a decent job of separating that from confirmation of second-half trends – I’m looking at you, Gators – but I have no doubt that my mileage will vary from yours, in some cases, probably significantly.
- Alabama. Okay, not it in this case. This wasn’t the greatest ‘Bama squad of all time, or even of Saban’s tenure, but it was plenty salty. And in the title game, it managed to outlast the kind of team that gives Saban the greatest trouble.
- Mississippi. Remind me again – this was the team that got smoked by Florida and beaten by Memphis, right? Weird.
- LSU. A little too uneven on offense to be great, but good enough otherwise to make the maneuvering to oust Miles seem silly.
- Tennessee. Welcome to the land of great expectations, Booch.
- Mississippi State. Another solid year, although you wonder how many of these Dan Mullen can lead before he decides to coach somewhere else.
- Arkansas. If there’s an art to making eight-win teams look better than their records, Bert is a master.
- Georgia. I still can’t figure out how a team can win ten games and emerge totally irrelevant, but the Dawgs somehow managed to pull off that trick.
- Florida. It’s a power poll, remember? I don’t see how you can overlook how badly the Gators fell off in the second half of the season.
- Auburn. On the bright side, nobody is going to be taking the Tigers’ 2016 national title chances too seriously.
- Texas A&M. The bloom has come off Kevin Sumlin’s rose with a vengeance.
- Vanderbilt. Of all the seasons the Commodores have had, this was certainly one of them.
- Kentucky. The only difference I can see between UK’s 2014 and 2015 is that Mike Stoops didn’t get another mid-season raise.
- Missouri. Had a season to forget.
- South Carolina. Had a season Steve Spurrier wishes he could forget.
Get The Picture 
One day, it will be said of Hugh Freeze, “yeah, but he couldn’t beat Memphis!”.
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Too few great quarterbacks? Chad Kelly was clearly the best throughout the season. Jake Coker came into his own and really played his best when the spotlight was its brightest. Dak Prescott was the GPOOE for Mullen, and now let’s see how the Bizarro Dogs are A.D. Josh Dobbs may be the conference’s 2nd best QB next year, but he still hasn’t won anything of consequence. LSU wins in spite of its QB play sort of like another team I follow. Florida may have a worse dumpster fire at QB than us next season if Franks isn’t ready. The WLOCP may make this year’s Missouri game look like an offensive explosion if neither team can find a QB.
Offense in the SEC could be ugly in 2016 …
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“Offense in the SEC could be ugly in 2016 …”
True, but how many times has THAT been said of the SEC…yet the conference holds its own with D. Of course it’s hard to tell if the D is good or the O sucks until the post season.
Also, that 10 wins and irrelevant thing…I can imagine the voters struggled with where to put the Dawgs in the ‘way-to-early’ top 25. To watch them play you’d think they went 6-6 but the 10 wins have the voters thinking that we may not fail too far next year…new staff and talent and all.
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There’s a difference between good teams that play dominant defense and a smoking crater of offense due to questionable talent at QB. The problem is that the QB meme will be played up by the national media as a rationale for questioning an SEC champion that doesn’t wear crimson and white in the CFP.
I completely agree about your comment regarding the way-to-early top 25. It was an empty 10 win season, but there is a lot of talent returning especially on defense. We have to answer a LOT of big questions on the offensive side of the ball.
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The SEC still has the best players but they don’t always play the best. Lots of SEC coaches seem afraid to even have a great QB.
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I know you made a disclaimer, but I could never put UGA ahead of Florida. They destroyed us. And we never, IMO, showed much offensive improvement the rest of the year. To think that we could beat them if we played them again, to me, is just wishful thinking. I know all of this is subjective, but head to head matchups count for a lot in my book.
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Then I guess you’d have Ole Miss ahead of Alabama. 😉
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And Arkansas ahead of Tennessee.
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I would put Arkansas ahead of Tennessee, yes. They beat Tennessee in Knoxville. Brandon Allen is the real deal. Doesn’t a win in a hostile environment count for anything? And, before it is brought up, I don’t remember any fluky five turnovers like in the Ole Miss/Bama game.
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Well played.
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I have to respectfully disagree with that, Senator. Bama actually put themselves in a position to win that game versus Ole Miss at the end, despite everything that went wrong for them. Georgia was never even competitive, much less in a position to win the game against Florida, after the 1st quarter.
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Would you put Bama ahead of Clemson? Silly I know, but settling it on the field trumps all else to me. I realize there are other factors, like playing on an opponents’ field, margin of victory, etc. But they beat us badly, in November, at a neutral site. It was not competitive. I did not see enough offense in our remaining games to speculate that we could outscore Florida if we played them again. It may be a closer game, as their offense was terrible. But they were terrible when we played them, too, and we still got killed.
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Like I said, it’s a Power Poll, not a snapshot of a particular moment. I understand how some might feel differently, but the Florida team I saw finish the season was a shell of its former self.
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I would like to see us play them with a real 1st team QB rather than a 3rd team QB inserted as fake juice.
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Agree.
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Well, assuming we had different play callers I could see us winning. But, yeah, I get your point.
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Yes, UGA kicked our you know what, but in retrospect the gameplanning for that one was heavily influenced by McGarrity. Richt knew he had to win to keep his job, and with his QB and O line faltering, chose to draw one to an inside straight rather 4 to a 10 kicker. Knowing what we know now, maybe with a pair of tens we would have had a shot.
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Fla. kicked us. Sorry.
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” I still can’t figure out how a team can win ten games and emerge totally irrelevant”
That’s easy, don’t beat anything with a pulse for a few years.
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First of all, only one of the 6 teams you have ahead of UGA had a better season record. This is a power poll you say? OK, over the last five games Bama, UGA, and the Vols were 5-0. Arkansas and Ole Miss were 4-1, Miss. State was 3-2, and LSU was 2-3. Soft schedule you say? Well, you can only play who you play. Politics got us a soft opponent like Penn State. We handled them pretty easily through most of the game in spite of our coach leaving. I know we spanked the ‘Cocks and Kentucky (on a % basis) way worse than anyone else they played. If you looked at some of these other programs with the same critical eye you apply to ours, you’d see we compare favorably to most. Losing to Memphis or Toledo? Come on.
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Maybe Ole Miss is the new Georgia!
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Mississippi State. Another solid year, although you wonder how many of these Dan Mullen can lead before he decides to coach somewhere else.
Dan Mullen’s already decided to coach somewhere else. Somewhere else just hasn’t decided to hire him yet.
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