When Alabama hired Lane Kiffin as its new offensive coordinator prior to last season, the move came with plenty of speculation. How will Kiffin get along with head coach Nick Saban? How will his offense fare against SEC defenses, and how fast will Alabama’s offensive stars be able to pick up the new system?

As it turns out, Kiffin-to-Alabama was the personnel move of the year around college football. Alabama threw the ball more than ever before, and Amari Cooper shattered a number of Crimson Tide receiving records on his way to winning the Biletnikoff Award as the nation’s top wideout.

The Tide ranked third in the SEC and top 20 in the nation in total offense after failing to crack the top 20 in any of the previous five seasons (it only broke into the top 30 once in that time), and it did so with a converted running back playing quarterback for the first time at the college level.

The improvements and added explosiveness were noticeable right away, and Alabama’s SEC championship affirmed the Kiffin hire once and for all.

Fast forward through the early portion of the offseason, and there are six new offensive coordinators in the SEC: Dan Enos (Arkansas), Doug Nussmeier (Florida), Brian Schottenheimer (Georgia), Shannon Dawson (Kentucky), Mike DeBord (Tennessee) and Andy Ludwig (Vanderbilt).

Each new coordinator brings his own flavor to the SEC, and while many (like Schottenheimer, Dawson and DeBord) were only brought in because the former OC in place earned a better job, each coordinator will face his own set of challenges in trying to replicate what Kiffin did last year.

That’s why it’s Schottenheimer who faces the most pressure in his first year at his new job. Kiffin set a standard last year that the SEC’s other elite programs will hope to match, and Georgia is among those elite programs. Furthermore, UGA has championship-caliber talent in place right now, and it will be up to Schottenheimer to find a new quarterback and to enhance the entire offense in pursuit of a division title, just as Kiffin did last year.

Schottenheimer has experience in winning with an offense that runs the ball to hide deficiencies at the quarterback position. In fact, he reached back-to-back AFC title games with the New York Jets by running the ball and hiding his quarterback, and that was at the NFL level.

He’ll need to take a similar approach this year at Georgia, and if he can, Georgia could win the weakest division in SEC history (dating back to its split into two divisions in 1992). The Dawgs return Nick Chubb as their workhorse back, the same back who finished second in the SEC in rushing as a freshman despite starting only eight games. They’ll also return fellow sophomore Sony Michel, who was actually the more touted back of the two in last year’s recruiting class.

But what UGA won’t be returning is a quarterback with starting experience. Brice Ramsey was the team’s primary backup a year ago, and he came on in relief to close out Georgia’s bowl win over Louisville in December. He remains in competition with Faton Bauta, who has also impressed coaches this spring but brings even less playing experience to the table.

If there were ever a coordinator capable of leading an efficient offense in the SEC with those pieces, it’s Schottenheimer. Better yet, Schottenheimer has experience as a quarterbacks coach, which bodes well for Georgia and its search for a new signal caller.

He was Phillip Rivers’ first position coach in the NFL, laying the foundation for the Pro Bowl-laden career he’s enjoyed since 2004. And while Schottenheimer did more to hide Sanchez than anything else while in New York, he did coach him through the best days of his career, and was gone before the infamous “butt fumble” ever took place.

So there’s plenty of reason to believe Schottenheimer can determine the right quarterback for his system in a short amount of time, and there’s just as much reason to have faith in his ability to develop that quarterback. Considering how closely this year’s Georgia team parallels those great Jets teams (great run game, great defense, decent quarterback), the expectations for Schottenheimer in 2015 are sky-high.

On top of all of that, Schottenheimer may be coaching for Mark Richt’s job in his first year on campus. Richt is preparing to lead Georgia for his 15th season as head coach, but if Georgia can’t at least win the East when the rest of the division is this poor, he may finally lose the last scraps of patience UGA fans have clung to since his 2005 SEC championship.

That means Schottenheimer doesn’t really have much time to tinker with his offense before the unit either hits its stride or fails in trying to do so. Georgia could easily go a perfect 6-0 against the East, but it drew both Alabama and Auburn from the West, which is about as unlucky as it gets. Georgia will likely have to split those two cross-divison games or hope the rest of the mediocre East beats up on itself if its to win the division. And considering how many points we know Kiffin and Gus Malzahn’s offenses can post, Schottenheimer’s offense is going to need to have its two best performances on those two Saturdays.

If that’s not pressure, I’m not sure what is. Other OCs will face their own pressure, but none like that. Schottenheimer hasn’t been a part of college football since he served as tight ends coach at USC in 2000, but if he can’t produce right away, it could spell doom for the program he just joined.