ATLANTA — From Greg Sankey to Diego Pavia, Day 1 of SEC Media Days delivered.
Talkin’ Season began with 4 notable quarterbacks in this conference, all of whom could be in the All-SEC conversation at season’s end. We had LSU, South Carolina, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt all take the stage, with varying levels of interest.
What did I find interesting? A lot. I witnessed Paul Finebaum bring in a random UPS driver to SEC Media Days, simply because he was outside and asked what was going on at the College Football Hall of Fame. The UPS worker’s face was that of pure amazement, as was mine when I asked Paul if he was recognized or if he told the man his name.
“Paul Finestein.”
If you were like the UPS driver and curious what a glimpse of SEC Media Days looked like, here were the things I found interesting from Day 1 in Atlanta:
Nick Saban … could return to coaching?
It took approximately 1 full season of college football without Nick Saban on the sidelines for us to start wondering about … if Saban would return to the sidelines. That discussion reached new levels on Monday when Greg McElroy, who played for Saban at Alabama, said on “McElroy and Cubelic” that he heard from a notable source that he don’t believe Saban is done coaching.
“This is a little bit out of left field, but the question was asked of me … a very much in the know person that I have a lot of respect for and have spent a lot of time around and just really, really admire,” McElroy said. “They seem to think Nick Saban’s not done coaching. I had a similar reaction. He’s pretty adamant that he thinks Nick Saban will be coaching again. … Look, if it wasn’t someone notable, I’d never say a word.”
McElroy doesn’t throw that around lightly. He also doesn’t have any reason to put his coach into the spotlight.
Saban, who was at SEC Media Days last year with ESPN’s coverage of the event, won’t be in Atlanta this week to address that. He’ll continue his role on College GameDay this fall, as well as his coverage of the NFL Draft.
It’s also worth noting that Saban will be 74 years old in October, and he’s still got an office at the Alabama facility. A return to coaching doesn’t necessarily mean it would be a job leading a Power Conference program, though obviously, that’s where any sort of speculation would shift to.
Whatever the case, McElroy kicked off the week with a bang.
Greg Sankey definitely isn’t settling on a conference schedule until the future of the Playoff is figured out
I was wondering if we were going to get any sort of tea leaves related to the SEC future scheduling model. Would the conference stick with an 8- or 9-game conference schedule? Better yet, would there be any sort of timetable to settle on that?
Nah. This is still all about the Playoff.
“I’ve been careful about giving dates,” Sankey said when asked about the time table for settling on an 8- or 9-game schedule. “I said repeatedly I learned during COVID that you want to use your time. It won’t linger terribly much longer.”
Ah, there’s the key part. Sankey knows that “it won’t linger terribly much longer” because the deadline to settle on the 2026 Playoff format is in Dec. 1. In other words, there won’t be some carryover into the offseason. It’d be stunning to see such a move reach the 11th hour, though the hangups over the amount of automatic bids per conference got us to this point.
Sankey reiterated that he doesn’t feel pressure to align with conferences who tout their own 9-game conference schedules while taking shots at the SEC.
“I don’t believe there’s anyone looking to swap their conference schedule and its opponents with the opponents played by SEC conference teams in our conference schedule, be it 8 or 9,” Sankey said. “I handed out a bunch of stats that created a stir in Destin that showed there is a rigor here that is unique. In the SEC we’re not lacking for quality competition among our 16 football teams, but we’re going to continue to evaluate whether increasing the number of conference football games is appropriate for us.
“As I’ve said repeatedly, understanding how the CFP will evaluate strength of schedule and even strength of record is critically important in our decision-making.”
Austin Simmons is well aware of how much he looks like Tua Tagovailoa
Apologies if I’m beating a dead horse, but it still blows me away whenever I look at the Ole Miss quarterback. Outside of him being a few inches taller, Simmons and Tua Tagovailoa look like they could be the same person. At the very least, they could be brothers. Take one look at them and you’ll see the similarities, which go beyond the fact that they were both lefties who were recruited by Lane Kiffin.
So, is he aware of that? Oh yeah.
“I’ve heard that so many times,” Simmons said after nodding and laughing. “I’ve been hearing that since I was in the 6th grade, and that really says a lot, honestly. My hair was way shorter than this. I’m actually trying to grow my hair out so I don’t look like him as much … but yeah, I’ve been hearing that a lot growing up.”
I offered a solution — he could start throwing righty.
“I mean,” Simmons said, “it wouldn’t go as far.”
Fair point. If Simmons is getting Tagovailoa comps after his first season as a starter, that’d be as promising of a development as possible. Tagovailoa led Alabama to a national runner-up season in his first season as a starter, though he was in a slightly different spot than Simmons, who’ll try to lead Ole Miss to its first Playoff berth even though it ranks last in the SEC in percentage of returning production.
But unlike Tagovailoa, Simmons was at SEC Media Days before he ever started a game. Shoot, Simmons was an SEC Media Days attendee and a college graduate (at age 19) before he ever started a game.
So hey, maybe Simmons and Tagovailoa aren’t the same person after all.
(I’m still gonna need to see them in the same room at the same time to be convinced this isn’t some massive Lane Kiffin prank.)
Lane Kiffin still sounds like he’s frustrated by everything in this system … except when it comes to trolling Hugh Freeze
Eight times during his press conference on Monday, Kiffin said the word “system.” In a not-so-surprising development, Kiffin wasn’t exactly complimentary of said system. Whether that was the salary cap and teams offering over it or the Playoff — Kiffin did say that it didn’t take long to get over being left out of the 12-team field — the Ole Miss coach seemed frustrated by the subjectiveness of the sport.
And hey, maybe Kiffin has a point. If Ole Miss really is staying by the guidelines at a time when the new revenue sharing era, which began on July 1, has yet to yield an actual punishment, it’s understandable why he’s not totally content with the future of the sport.
But on the flip side, Kiffin also just put together Ole Miss’s 3rd 10-win season in 4 years and as he mentioned, he’s got the 3rd-most SEC wins of the 16 teams in the conference in the last 3 years. There’s a certain level of juice (pun intended) that Kiffin has heading into Year 6 that’s different than any other place he’s been.
That means he gets to troll Hugh Freeze on social media without pushback. Specifically, Kiffin gets to troll Freeze’s golf game, which has been a popular topic on The Plains amid Auburn’s June recruiting struggles.
“I like Coach Freeze, so I think they think that was something to do with like I was fishing, it was golfing. It really wasn’t that,” Kiffin said. “I have a thing with him going back a few years ago when he posted a picture in response to me of like some two pound bass or something like that. So I kind of always posted bigger-fish pictures back towards him.
“Had nothing to do with his golf game, which sounds like he’s doing amazing at that.”
And as Kiffin noted, that fishing picture was taken on Sunday, which was during a dead period. Ergo, nobody can make the same dig at him lacking recruiting focus that they’ve made with Freeze.
Kiffin’s fishing game and trolling game remain strong.
And last, but never least … Diego Pavia is 1 of 1
From the moment that Pavia walked to his crowded podium, I wanted to know.
No, I didn’t want to know what the Vanderbilt quarterback was listening to in his headphones as he pulled up (it was Future). I didn’t want to know about which celebrities he’s rubbed elbows with during his offseason in the spotlight (comedian Theo Von topped that list). I didn’t even want to know why he went with a black bowtie and a black suit with a white shirt, which basically looked like Will Farrell and John C. Reilly in the job interview scene during “Step Brothers.”
(OK, I did want to know that … I asked Pavia about if “Step Brothers” was the inspiration and he said fellow SEC Media Days representative Randon Fontenette put the look together for him because he didn’t have anything as of Sunday morning.)
All I wanted to know was whether Pavia was closer to 5-8 instead of the 6-0 that he was listed at on Vandy’s official website.
Another media member was also curious about that, and he asked Pavia how tall he really was.
“Do you have measuring tape?” Pavia joked. “Maybe with some shoes on, I’m 6 foot, but I would say I’m probably 5-10 1/2 or 5-11. I haven’t gotten measured in awhile. You know, older people shrink.”
Fair point. Pavia is 24 years old and entering Year 6 of his college career, which only happened after he won a lawsuit with the NCAA over his eligibility clock. But after walking behind him, I can confirm that he’s not shrinking to 5-8.
If Monday’s crowd of media members was any indication, Pavia’s reputation is growing. That sort of thing tends to happen when you beat No. 1 Alabama, just as Pavia’s hero, Johnny Manziel, did once upon a time. Like Manziel, Pavia will get a rematch against Alabama, this time in Tuscaloosa.
What’s he looking forward to with that game in Alabama?
“Maybe eat some food there or something,” Pavia said. “Nah, I’m just kidding. That stadium is electric. I’ve heard about it. It’s gonna come down to who’s more prepared that week and who wants it more.”
Oh, and what about the Ryan Williams comment about “killing an ant with a sledgehammer” that he said during a film session with Jon Gruden?
“The kid is naturally talented. A gift from God, you know,” Pavia said. “So, I’ll be excited to play him in his home stadium.”
So are we, Diego. So are we.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
