“The only thing that can knock the SEC out of the Playoff is parity.”

If you’re one of those folks who thinks rooting for SEC rival programs is a virtue because overall, a stronger conference aids in Georgia’s quest to make the CFP field, Dan Wolken throws cold water on your logic.

These arguments about conference supremacy, however, feel more like a relic of the BCS era in college football and not particularly relevant to what happens with the College Football Playoff. In fact, at this point, it may be better for the SEC’s playoff aspirations if it had just two good teams and 12 others who couldn’t run a basic dive play without tripping over the line of scrimmage.

Until proven otherwise, the CFP selection committee places a high value on two things, in exactly this order: 1) Power conference teams having zero or one loss, and 2) Winning a conference championship. Which means the worst thing for any league, including the SEC, would be having a bunch of top-10 caliber teams that are more likely to beat up on each other rather than have one emerge unscathed.

Like it or not, he’s got a point.  To date, no two-loss team has cracked the semis.  And if conference weakness mattered all that much, would we easily assume, as we all do, that Clemson’s all but a lock to go again this season?

So if you were feeling guilty about rooting for Tennessee and South Carolina to go down last weekend, maybe let it go.  Watching programs like those go down in upsets is almost as much fun as watching the Dawgs win.  Why deprive yourself?

If you flop it, they won’t come.

Bill Connelly writes that it’s not so much that college football has an attendance problem, as it is that certain college football programs have an attendance problem.

It is worth mentioning, however, that attendance isn’t falling everywhere. Comparing home attendance in 2018 to the averages from 2005 to 2017, 50 FBS teams were higher in the former than the latter, and 27 more fell by less than 2,000 fans per game. Things are tilting in the wrong direction, obviously, but at only a slight angle.

In reality, a handful of schools have driven the averages down for everybody.

1. Fallen blue-bloods. From 2005 to 2017, five schools — Florida, Florida State, Tennessee, UCLA and USC — averaged 82,902 per game in home attendance. In 2018, they averaged 70,472. Only one of these storied programs (Florida) reached bowl eligibility.

Well, now.  I’m sure they’ll get right on tha…

If Florida State, Tennessee, UCLA and USC were to all rebound to some degree in 2019, that might be all it takes for FBS’ overall attendance to improve over 2018 totals. Of course, those teams went 1-3 in Week 1, and the team that won lost its starting quarterback to injury. That’s not encouraging.

Er, when does basketball season start, anyway?

Great minds think alike.

From Junior to Bianchi:

We sometimes chuckle and roll our eyes at some of the outlandish statements that come from the mouth of FAU coach Lane Kiffin, but in this case, the Lane Train is absolutely correct when he says UCF belongs in the SEC.

Actually, after watching some SEC teams embarrass themselves in Week 1 of the college football season, UCF probably belongs at the top of the SEC — just below Alabama and Georgia and right there with Florida, Auburn and LSU.

During a teleconference with reporters earlier this week, Kiffin talked about this week’s game against UCF and playing the Knights last season when they handed the Owls a 56-36 loss. Before last year’s game, Kiffin recalled an on-field conversation he had with UCF coach Josh Heupel.

“I remember talking to Coach [Heupel] and I was like, ‘You guys look like an SEC team over there,’” remembered Kiffin…

One day, Gus Malzahn needs to pay, and pay dearly, for the sin of having Auburn not show up for a bowl game.

Remember, it’s what’s on the front of the jersey that sells.

Murray State head football coach Mitch Stewart shares a recruiting tip:

Murray State became one of the darlings of last year’s college basketball season. The team was led by Ja Morant, a consensus first-team All-American and the eventual #2 overall pick in this June’s NBA Draft. I asked Coach Stewart if that publicity has had any impact on the football program, and what it’s like recruiting at Murray State in general… “It definitely helped us from a recruiting standpoint. Automatically kids recognize our logo. We have a yellow ‘M’ on our shirts when we walk into a school so a kid gets really excited because he thinks he’s talking to University of Michigan at first. But then we say no, we’re Murray State and the kid goes ‘Oh, Ja Morant!’ And boom we have something to talk about. Ja Morant awarded us $317 million in free advertising.”

“Sometimes we’re talking to a kid and his buddy is a FBS guy but because he knows Ja or is a fan we get to build a relationship…”

I hope Morant at least got a thank you for that.  Not that you can spend thank yous…

TFW it’s not always about havoc

Just a reminder that Georgia’s defense did okay last Saturday night:

On Saturday, the Commodores hope their new starter can rekindle his old magic when he returns to his home state to face Purdue.

“He’s got to go into this ball game knowing and understanding that his team needs him,” Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason said. “So let’s get to work. He’s a guy who’s mature enough to understand that.”

Perhaps a change of scenery will help the 6-foot-6, 225-pound fifth-year senior jump start a career some believe could lead to an NFL job.

He needs to perform better than he did in his Vanderbilt debut last week, going 14 of 25 for 83 yards, no touchdowns, no interceptions and no completions longer than 12 yards in a 30-6 loss to No. 3 Georgia.

That translates to a passer rating of 84.56, good buddy.  And it’s not like Neal didn’t have some talent to throw the ball to, either.

27,235 beers on the wall, 27,235 beers…

LSU fans in public seating at Tiger Stadium drank 27,235 beers on Saturday.

— Matt Houston (@MattCHouston) September 5, 2019

Honestly, I’m a little surprised it’s that low.

DEVASTATED

Kid, they weren’t making fun of your shirt.  They were making fun of your school allegiance.