To reiterate something I posted about yesterday, this strikes me as kind of sad.
Both Smart and Jennings have shared their LSU experiences with Georgia’s players this week. Playing in Tiger Stadium is almost a mythical proposition for players of SEC Eastern Division teams that don’t play LSU as a cross-division rival. Because of the current eight-game SEC schedule model, the Bulldogs will be making their first trip to Baton Rouge since 2008 and won’t return until 2030.
“All of those guys who have played there previous years have told us it’s going to be a great environment and it’s going to be a hard-nosed game,” senior wideout Terry Godwin said. “This is what you come to the SEC for, to play in games like this. It’s going to be a great game.”
He’s right. Which is why it shouldn’t be something experienced every other decade by fans or players. It’s pathetic that someone has to describe a conference game as “almost a mythical proposition for players”, SEC. The conference should offer something better than that.
Get The Picture 
I’m all in favor of a 9 game conference schedule. I’m also dead set against playoff expansion. Unfortunately I think playoff expansion will happen at the expense of one regular season game – and that will make a 9 game conference schedule less likely IMO
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There really is no workable solution for playoff expansion without blowing up the whole system. No way will schools agree to play one fewer game during the regular season. The Power 5 aren’t going to give up the conference championship games. The bowl games can’t afford to push back selections another week to wait for 1st round losers. A game the following week puts another 20 hours of game preparation right in the middle of final exams.
Unless Mickey Mouse throws enough money at it to make everyone happy, I just don’t see a scenario where expansion makes sense. The quickest way to Mickey’s pocketbook would be to play more meaningful regular season games … the 9-game schedule or better OOC scheduling.
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Absolutely no reason for anyone to give up a regular season game. That would only be an issue of expansion went too far, eight is the max that can work. And another reason why I feel it is as far as it will go. It is also the number you have to go to get enough in to remove silly obstacles, put more value on conference championships, and enhance the regular season games. All the scare tactics, like losing home games are contrived and misleading. Follow the agenda.
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I’m at a point where dropping the permanent crossover rival game would be ok. That’s probably not a popular idea with some but it could be sold. Ours and Bama/UT are the most traditional and I don’t think it would matter that much to most. ymmv
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No way do I want to give up the Auburn game annually so Missouri and Texas A&M can be in the SEC. UGA/Auburn and Bama/UTK are the only reason we have permanent crossover games.
The loss of the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry would probably be the Bridge too far that would send me to the golf course on Saturdays.
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I wouldn’t have either until the fiasco with the Cam year/game. After that, any required interaction with them should be minimized. I thought the South’s Oldest Rivalry was the best example of a college rivalry until then, now I wish it would go away. Will never feel the same about anything regarding them, it showed what they really are. Sorry I missed it for so long.
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2010 just makes me want to beat them more and to hope they lose every game they play (Auburn-Florida is my ultimate meteor game). Before that, I would agree the game was what a college rivalry should be.
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Are you insane? It wouldn’t matter to most?
The Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry is nothing to be pissed away so we can play shitty Arkansas, Miss, Miss St. more often.
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Agreed. Round robins are for the NFL.
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I agree but would a 9 game conference schedule get us to Baton Rouge once every 4 years?
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Been there, done that. Let’s not blow this outta proportion, it’s a neat environment but from my perspective it doesn’t hold a candle to playing at Clemson in the 80’s or even at SoCar at night. The only difference may be the amount of drinking their fans do & how mean-spirited they can be.
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Maybe so, but I think SE Louisiana might be a slightly better destination to visit than Columbia or Clemson.
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I’ve been to both, and in my opinion, LSU is a much louder venue than Clemson.
However, the loudest environment I’ve ever been in is Auburn. Not always, but when they have a good team late in the year, it is a deafening place.
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Agree. Like Clemson, LSU’s seats literally go straight up (especially upper deck, where seat belts should be mandatory). But LSU is totally enclosed on all sides to boot, with an extra 20K seats as well. IMO it’s not really all that close when its a big game for both schools.
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Clemson sucks compared to Red Stick….
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It’s been touched on in another post, but losing Austin Peay, MTSU, and UMass wouldn’t hurt my feelings at all. Replacing them with a home and home SEC west opponent would make the season much more enjoyable, IMO.
What is the benefit to a Power 5 school to play this many cupcake games? Are they buying scrimmages to rest and develop players further into the season? Using them as by-week public practices?
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Exactly. We’re playing those 3 cupcakes, and adding a 9th conference game is impossible? Just dump a cupcake and add the game, for crying out loud.
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Yep, there will be many unforeseen changes over the next decade so let’s hope this trip is memorable.
This will be the first game this season I feel a ‘B’ game by our Dawgs could open the door to give our opponent a chance to make it a nail-biter. We need a focused and disciplined game.
I certainly feel we are the better team and could win it by multiple scores. I think Tucker fills the box with beef and forces Borrow to beat us with his arm. Barrow will have his moments but if he has to perform for 60 minutes, he’ll make mistakes. We may see the D bring some extra pressure at times to shake Barrow.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the ball, mix it with the full wrath of the offense. Vertical passes, power runs, jet sweeps, passes to the backs, RPO plays…the whole gamut.
LSU will need more than the 19pts they put on FU.
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And maybe even get #16 involved…you think
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I would like that. Some vertical bombs and maybe another jet sweep…unless your talking about John Seter 😉
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I don’t want us going in there wide-eyed. The one disturbing trend of the Smart era to this point is the cross-divisional road record. We have not played well (or even showed up in Oxford) in either game. No reason to make this any more than it is … another road game in the SEC. LSU is flawed at QB, and we need to take advantage of that early and often.
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I should finish my thought. This LSU team is not last year’s Auburn (at season’s end) or 2016 Ole Miss.
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LSU is a better overall team than 2016 Ole Miss, but they don’t put the same kind of pressure on your defense. Also, it probably goes without saying that Georgia is better in 2018 than in 2016.
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Good talk for the players that didn’t travel to Jordan Hare last year.
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The East and West are in the same conference in name only at this point.
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Put another way, Georgia and Texas A&M have been in the “same conference” for 7 years, but haven’t played a regular season game since 1980. They won’t play Georgia until their 8th year in the conference and won’t host them until their 13 year. In their first 100 years in the conference with Georgia, they will host them a total of 8 times.
And its the same math for every other team in the West except Auburn. Mythical indeed.
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I really hate the expanse of time we play the west teams. A 9 game SEC schedule and the unpopular dropping of the permanent West team would give us a quick rotation for cross rivals. It’s weird having Mizzu and TAMU in the SEC, but they are here…less play ’em all. We would probably be excited about playing either of those teams if they weren’t in the SEC.
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Or just add a conference game and have one less scrimmage per year.
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You’re an adult at 18 and have a life expectancy of just under 79 years. If you were born the day Texas A&M joined the conference, you will have 5 opportunities to see Georgia play in college station in your adult lifetime. 6 if your parents take you when you are 12.
Again, same for all other West teams other than Auburn.
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Which is the way it was before ’92.
The gap is a reason why the game is mythical and so exciting.
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Another option would be to move Bama and Auburn to the East and send Mizzou and Vandy to the West. The only problem with that scenario would be the unbalance of power that would result with the East being loaded.
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I forgot to mention then you would rotate the two cross division games and eliminate the permanent cross division rival game. You could still go nine conference games if desired and really increase the frequency of playing everyone in the conference.
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Leave it alone. I’ll take the tradition of playing Auburn and the WLOCP over more trips to LSU. Yes I have been to all 3.
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This guy nails it. I could live with his exact proposal, though in the interest of the never-change crowd, you could tweak it to have the current SEC East / West every OTHER year by moving UT in with us, LSU in with Auburn and Alabama and South Carolina to a 4 pod.
Basically, he has us playing Florida, Auburn and South Carolina EVERY YEAR, with 5 rotators. Yes. Yes. Yes. The public would eat this up like leftover turkey on black Friday.
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The public would complain they don’t get their every other year tradition of going to the horse races and seeing the leaves in Kentucky.
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Admitting Mizzou and A&M have consequences. Not to mention, you’d still do that every 4 years instead of every 2. Small price to pay to not go 12 years between visits to 4 other FOUNDING MEMBERS of the SEC.
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We didn’t play at all from 1954 to 1978, so this isn’t unique
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We’re both founding members of the SEC, yet we’ve only played 30 times total. We didn’t play at all from 1954 to 1978, so this isn’t unique. Not saying I like it, but it’s also not unusual in the history of the conference.
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Exactly
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I’m for anything reducing the number of cupcake games per season. That said, replacing cupcakes doesn’t automatically mean they have to be filled with SEC West teams. I’d like to see us get out of the Southeastern region and play solid teams on the West Coast and Mid-West. A home and home with SC, Washington, Stanford would generate a lot of national buzz. Now that Texas is re-emerging that would make for an interesting matchup.
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