Ad Disclosure
Reviewing SEC penalty stats from the 2016 season. How does your team stack up?
Published:
With the 2016 season completely in the rearview mirror, we thought it would be interesting to look at the penalty statistics from around the league.
Jim McElwain may need to get on his team in line this offseason, as the Gators, despite playing one less regular season game than anticipated, led the SEC in penalties, penalty yards, penalties per game, and penalty yards given up per game in 2016.
Some SEC fans love to point out that Alabama gets all the calls but judging from the penalty flags thrown last season, the Tide were flagged more than any other league team outside of Florida. Of course, Alabama played more games than any other league team but its 5.7 penalties called per game rates as the eighth-most flagged team in the SEC.
Interestingly enough, the two division winners were the two teams flagged the most in 2016. Arguably the team with the most disappointing record in the league, Ole Miss, was near the bottom of the list, ranking No. 13 with 59 penalties called on the Rebels.
Auburn proved to be the most disciplined team in the league, having only 4.7 penalties called a game against the team – That was 2.1 penalties fewer called per game than Florida.
Here’s the complete breakdown of the flags called in the SEC in 2016:
| Rank | Team | G | Pen | Pen. Yds | Pen/G | Yds/G |
| 1 | Florida | 13 | 88 | 758 | 6.8 | 58.3 |
| 2 | Alabama | 15 | 86 | 660 | 5.7 | 44 |
| 3 | Texas A&M | 13 | 81 | 685 | 6.2 | 52.7 |
| 4 | Missouri | 12 | 80 | 685 | 6.7 | 57.1 |
| 5 | Tennessee | 13 | 80 | 735 | 6.2 | 56.5 |
| 6 | Arkansas | 13 | 80 | 680 | 6.2 | 52.3 |
| 7 | Georgia | 13 | 74 | 547 | 5.7 | 42.1 |
| 8 | Mississippi State | 13 | 68 | 617 | 5.2 | 47.5 |
| 9 | Vanderbilt | 13 | 67 | 575 | 5.2 | 44.2 |
| 10 | Kentucky | 13 | 66 | 605 | 5.1 | 46.5 |
| 11 | South Carolina | 13 | 65 | 606 | 5.0 | 46.6 |
| 12 | Auburn | 13 | 61 | 475 | 4.7 | 36.5 |
| 13 | Ole Miss | 12 | 59 | 520 | 4.9 | 43.3 |
| 14 | LSU | 12 | 58 | 492 | 4.8 | 41 |
Does anything about the SEC penalties from 2016 stand out to you?
A graduate of the University of Tennessee, Michael Wayne Bratton oversees the news coverage for Saturday Down South. Michael previously worked for FOX Sports and NFL.com
