Wonder who’s pushing for an eight-game, one-permanent opponent approach to SEC scheduling? Look no further than here.
Arkansas Razorbacks
When Missouri joined the SEC, the Tigers needed an interdivision rival, so the SEC concocted the Battle Line Rivalry, which yielded an unwieldy trophy and a forced matchup. In a 1-7 model, Texas and Oklahoma and LSU and Texas A&M likely would be paired as rivals. If so, that should keep Missouri as Arkansas’ rival. That’s a bummer for Razorbacks fans who would enjoy seeing the old Southwest Conference rivalry with Texas renewed annually or the continuance of the Battle for the Golden Boot with LSU, but it’s a favorable draw for the ease of Arkansas’ schedule.
Auburn Tigers
The interruption of “Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry” would be among the worst consequences if the 1-7 model is embraced. Auburn and Georgia have squared off in all but three years since the start of the 20th century, and those interruptions were due to World Wars. The preservation of this rivalry and others is among the reasons why I favor a 3-6 model. Yet, there’s no denying Auburn’s schedule would lighten if the SEC opts for a 1-7 setup.
Kentucky Wildcats
Credit Mark Stoops with being Kentucky’s best coach since Bear Bryant, but he also benefits from the Wildcats routinely featuring one of the easiest schedules among SEC teams. An eight-game conference format would help UK continue that. South Carolina would be a logical rivalry partner, and the Wildcats could retain three layup nonconference games alongside its annual date with Louisville, which recently has trended in UK’s direction.
South Carolina Gamecocks
In a 3-6 schedule format, Georgia could be among the Gamecocks’ rivals. Avoiding an annual date with the Bulldogs would strip the Gamecocks of their best conference rivalry but also would be a win in their quest for bowl eligibility.
Tennessee Vols
No one suffered more from the current rivalry schedule format than the Vols. Alabama has won 15 straight in the “Third Saturday in October” series. Some Vols fans possess years-old cigars, in hopes of one day getting to light up in triumph again. Tennessee could come away the biggest winner in a 1-7 schedule format. With Alabama and Auburn paired, that should mean the Vols would win the sweepstakes to land Vanderbilt as their designated rival. Pair that with a couple of games against Mid-American Conference foes, and Tennessee would be well on its way to bowl eligibility.
Get The Picture 
That Tennessee write-up is hilarious.
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I thought the same thing 🙂
aubrun has beaten the vowels 15 straight? Got damn it must suck to be a Tennessee fan, Alabama schools are tough on ’em. I’d suggest they schedule UAB but UAB is pretty good. They could probably beat Troy, though.
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Reading comprehension is not my strong suit…
But as much as I hate aubrun I’d be ok if they beat ut 15 straight.
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Auburn has 7 of the last 8? over the Hillbillies. The Hillbilies are a 1 point Win away from GT having a winning streak over them. IIRC Fish Fry lost a 2 pt conversion attempt. They have a loss to Georgia State. I wouldn’t be scheduling UAB if I were UTk.
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1+7 is idiocy for a conference with 16 teams. ESPN should show the schedule debate and vote live C-SPAN style, so we can see who are the cowards who are willing to throw the rivalries that “just mean more” on the ash heap of college football history.
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If there is a secret vote where no one knows who voted for what option, it would make a bad decision to move to 1+7 look even worse. And cowardly.
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How the league could possibly not have Texas/Texas A&M and Texas/Arkansas as annual games is also beyond me.
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I don’t understand why those are our two choices. Why is a 2-7 option not on the table? 1 rivalry game isn’t enough. 3 forces rivalries that don’t really exist. Most teams have 2 rivals. What am I missing here? That they want a less intense schedule if they go to 9 conference games?
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The last sentence doesn’t make sense, sorry. I stand by everything else though!
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UF, AU and Carolina would be the 3 I would pick for UGA in a 3/6 scenario.
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I agree because we’re South Carolina’s only natural rival. I did the digging but don’t have the exact stats, but we’ve played South Carolina more over the 130 years than most of our SEC brethren.
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Correct, that said I think we get one year of 7-1…OU and TX join for 24, I hope we go 6-3 then..
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I don’t have any idea why the league would change anything until Texas and Oklahoma enter the SEC. Just play divisions and don’t upset the apple cart.
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UGA has more history with Clempson and S Car. than LSU or Miss State despite being in the same conference going back to the Southern Conference.
LSU has more history with Texas A&M than UGA and pre ’92 almost as much with Texas as UGA.
The power brokers and many fans want one big happy family going to each others houses regularly. How many cousins do you have which you haven’t talk to recently, much less visited their house?
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I went to a family reunion this weekend and didn’t recognize 70% of the people there.
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74 times. That’s more than Alabama (72), Tennessee (51), Mississippi (46), LSU (32), Mississippi State (25), Arkansas (16), Missouri (11), and Texas A&M (6).
And then Texas (5) – for crying out loud, we’ve been in a league with A&M for how long and we’ve played them once more all-time than fucking Texas? – and Oklahoma (1).
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Yep… Auburn wants OUT of playing Georgia and Alabama every year. Tigers have lost 14 of their last 17 to Georgia, including the last 5 and travel to Athens this year. They want OUT… LOL…
Guess what? So does Tennessee… UTjr. has lost 10 out of the last 12 they have played against Georgia, including 5 in a row and they travel to Athens this year. They want OUT… LOL…
Lot of Orange teams that would love to see a 1-7.
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No doubt about it…Barners want no part of it.
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I could live with losing Tennessee as an annual game since we didn’t really have a rivalry with them until 1992, but I really hope we don’t lose the annual Auburn matchup. Thank god McGarity isn’t still around, he’d probably give in to the 1+7 immediately and let us get stuck with Kentucky as the annual game.
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It definitely means a lot to us Columbus folks, doesn’t it?
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The Auburn game means as much to me as the Florida game as a native SOWEGAn.
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As a Marietta native, Auburn was bigger than UF pre Spurrier and is still bigger than UTatK. UF prior to Spurrier was a W and the last beach trip of the year, very fond memories in the 80s with the family. Plenty of Marietta High School, east Cobb and Roswell families regularly went out of state to Auburn. Ole Miss the same but smaller population. Auburn is the second biggest annual rivalry. If UF went home and home, Auburn could move back into 1st.
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I mean think about it – UT has lost 15 in a row and 10 out of 12 to Georgia, which means in the last 12 years they have lost 22 out of 24 football games to two schools.
Since Saban got to campus, Auburn is 5-10 against Bama and 3-13 (Georgia played Auburn twice in 2017) against Georgia. That’s 8 wins in 31 games against your two biggest rivals.
You want OUT and conference realignment is the perfect excuse, without crying Uncle.
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It gets even worse when you add in their records against the Handbags.
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It’s important to note that this is just an opinion piece where a writer is listing teams that would get an easier annual schedule – the writer is not reporting that Auburn is among the teams pushing the 1-7 schedule model. It might not surprise me if Auburn wants to weasel out of the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry, after all they’ve already torpedoed the tradition of playing it at the end of the schedule because it’s just too hard to play two tough games in three weeks. The horror. But I haven’t seen any credible reporting that suggests Auburn is actually lobbying to end the annual series.
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Don’t disagree. I don’t think they will lobby. Nor will UT. They’ll just ‘let it happen’ and not push to keep Georgia on an annual basis. In other words, there will be no lobbying from the Plains or Knoxville to keep both on the schedule. Auburn is a true rivalry – UT, not so much. Can’t stand them; but there is no real tradition there. Either we have been good or they have been good; but rarely at the same time.
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Georgia being good precludes Tennessee from being good – Tennessee’s performance in the 1990’s was built exclusively on their ability to recruit in Georgia, and now they have to wait behind Kirby in the self-checkout line.
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Same with Clempson
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Auburn and Tennessee bunched in with all these middling teams? I don’t ever want to hear about either of them ever thinking they belong on the same tier as Bama, UGA, LSU, Florida, etc. They are weak.
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This doesn’t exactly strike me as a Murderer’s Row of influence in the conference. Sankey’s going to get them in line for 3-6.
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If those assholes cost us The Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry, I will burn all their houses to the ground.
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I don’t know why a 2-6 is not on the table. The math is not tidy, but 2+ year cycle is far better than what we have now. Even a 3-5 is far better than now.
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Should I try to do some more,
25 or 6 to 4
Oh yeah….
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He that has the gold, makes the rules. Don’t underestimate the black hand of ESPN on what happens.
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Great point. You can bet if the ‘mouse’ is involved, that the mouse will look after the mouse – period.
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The mouse will think it is looking out for the mouse until they look around at empty seats, and the fans that do watch go from the most loyal to not supporting with the same dedication. They have done it before.
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(Bowl eligibility + $$$$) > (tradition + fan interest). Maybe the Saudi’s can save us.
Side note: considering what the SEC TV package will be worth, I wonder what price it would take for the conference to break away from the NCAA? Four divisions, 4 or 6 team playoff. We already know what the university presidents are, now it’s just a negotiation.
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of course I have a few why don’t they consider this….scenarios….and the answer is because the same people negotiating schedules are the same that negotiate coach’s contracts.
2-5 is a short term solution but that has problems, granted it is UGA gets UF and Auburn and Bama gets Auburn and UT, advantage Bama. Also S. Car still doesn’t get UGA as a rival, and we are their longest rivalry in the SEC.
3-6 solves many problems but no more money from Mickey Mouse, which is the end goal. So why give them something, when we can negotiate it in later? It would also be nice to have Mickey Mouse help get teams out of contracted games which would need to be dropped.
If you can’t negotiate the TV deal until Texas and OU are in, go with a 3-5 format. Sure it delays UGA going west to our new SEC family members. UGA hasn’t been to College Station but what is another few years?
I also get back to, I talk to Auburn family members, I have Florida neighbors, high school friends, coworkers etc, same with Tennessee. I don’t know many A&M fans. I want to beat Auburn, Florida, S. Carolina, Tennessee etc and then talk to those people wearing my UGA shirt. Who cares about some troll on Twitter, or Facebook from Texas or OKC? I don’t care when UGA goes out there and one game isn’t going to replace a century of 2 cultures disliking each other.
I hate Bama, and often pull against them. But, when they play Texas this year, I hope they take the 222-0 blowout record away from GT, pummeling Texas this fall. I want Texas so beaten they elect to stay in the BIg12 with the mid major programs joining their broken conference, which they broke. Tuck Fexas.
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Not football, but 6 of the 8 College Baseball World Series teams are SEC teams if it was 2024…don’t think they won’t dominate a 12 team football playoff either.
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And notice, Scott Stricklin, another one of McGarity’s terrible hires, has still never made it out of a Regional. Even the two he hosted.
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Shocking, I know, that a guy who was on Tech’s staff for so long can’t get to Omaha.
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Except for Tennessee! Bwwwaaahaahaahaa! They choked away the greatest baseball season evah against the Irish!
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Dammit, that supposed to be in response to PTC DAWG
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Auburn, Florida, Tennessee, South Carolina. Those are the teams I grew up hating. Still hate ’em. Their fans feel the same about UGA. Dropping any of them from the annual schedule for any other SEC team is dumb as shit, so of course Mickey is going to make it happen.
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In a 1-7, all of these teams are going to have harder schedules. We will still be on it for UK, UT, and AU every two years. When they don’t have us, they’ll have UF or LSU or OU or BAMA. If any AD is sitting here thinking he’s getting a break – especially if he’s in the East – he’s kidding himself. And there it is: Barnhart doesn’t want to give up his 2 MAC + Western Ky or Murray St gravy train. “But I’ll have to give up L’ville!” NO YOU WON’T, but you will have to grow a fucking pair.
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People crow about non conference punching bag games being terrible, then complain about bowls stinking because half the field is mediocre G5 teams. You can’t have it both ways.
Just reduce the eligibility to threshold to 5 wins and let the bowls invite who they want. Pretty sure 5 win Arkansas will get the invite over 6 win Louisiana Monroe.
Then we can quit avoiding playing games worth watching just so teams can get invites to bowls that still aren’t worth watching.
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This makes so much sense.. and when bowl game decisions are made, make each team declare the roster so if a team has a bunch of players opt out, the bowl committee can take that into consideration.
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Yeah, let’s let the league’s crappy teams dictate its scheduling model. Great idea.
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I’ll bet the three worst teams in the Premier League each year are against relegation.
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