In the words of Dwight K. Schrute, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
I’m not sure that the SEC has a whole lot of friends these days, but on the heels of conference media days in college football, I can assure you that there are plenty of enemies. Welcome to 2025, wherein conferences are more divided than ever and the debate over a new Playoff format is entirely to blame.
It got me thinking about the things that every SEC fan can get on board with rooting against in 2025. That last part is key. Obviously, SEC fans often find themselves rooting against teams like Notre Dame and Ohio State. But in order to make this list, there has to be something specific to 2025.
These 5 (ish) things are the SEC’s top 5 enemies for this season:
Carson Beck, Miami QB
You know you’re disliked if you get Florida and Georgia fans to agree on something. Florida fans have always had a reason to be anti-Beck after he admitted during the recruiting process that he used Florida to get an offer from Georgia. The Jacksonville native went to Georgia knowing that he’d be a Florida enemy. That’ll be the case again when his new school (Miami) hosts the Gators in Week 4. That speaks for itself.
But let’s be honest. Beck is on this list because of how he left Georgia.
The elbow injury in the SEC Championship Game prompted some especially pro-Gunner Stockton conversations by UGA, and quickly, you got the sense that Beck had isolated himself from the program. Believe who you want with the breakup story. I believe Georgia wanted Beck to return, despite his rocky 2024 season.
Instead, his Cam Ward-like move of declaring for the NFL Draft but then pivoting to Miami for a reported $4 million NIL deal didn’t sit well. It didn’t help that everyone connected the dots to Beck’s celebrity girlfriend (at the time), Hanna Cavinder. Let’s just say that Beck didn’t gain sympathy points from the masses when he and Cavinder’s luxury vehicles were stolen, and his approval rating reached a new low after he was accused of cheating on her.
Beck is the No. 1 villain in college football in 2025.
Clemson
Just like old times, right? I know what you might be thinking.
“Why is this year any different?”
I’m glad you asked. Well, Clemson could start as the No. 1 team in the country like it did in 2019-20. At the very least, Clemson is going to start as a top-3 team with bookended games vs. SEC contenders. We’ve got the battle for Death Valley with LSU at Clemson in Week 1, and South Carolina will look to beat Clemson in consecutive years for the first time since the Steve Spurrier era. Those games could have a major say in whether multiple SEC contenders have a Playoff argument, and if the Tigers somehow fail to win the ACC and are vying for an at-large berth, you can bet that SEC teams will want to poke holes in the résumé there, too.
Once upon a time, Clemson was seemingly the only thing that could get in the SEC’s way during the 2010s. An 0-3 mark against the SEC in 2024 would hardly suggest that’s the case heading into the latter half of the 2020s. But if there was ever a time for that to revert back to the way things were in the 2010s, Clemson fans know that this it.
Bret Bielema, Illinois coach
I mean, he literally was Shane Beamer‘s enemy when the 2 had to be separated during the Citrus Bowl after Bielema trolled the South Carolina coach over substitutions. The former Arkansas coach also accused SEC programs of tampering, and he spoke multiple times about wanting the SEC to go to a 9-game conference schedule. He also clapped back on the SEC’s spring meetings document outlining why the SEC had the toughest strength of schedule.
This is the same coach who left a legitimate Big Ten program and then won 1/3 of his games in the SEC, so naturally, Bielema picked the right time to finally oppose the conference he was once a part of. On the heels of Illinois securing its first SEC win in program history, Bielema has a legitimate shot to compete for a Playoff spot. Something tells me that if Illinois is in the hunt against at-large SEC teams, we’ll hear Bielema shout from the mountain tops that the conference isn’t as good as it once was.
James Franklin, Penn State coach
The funny thing is, Franklin delivered an answer at Big Ten Media Days about the number of conference games, and he indirectly praised the SEC while throwing shade at his own conference for switching from 8 to 9 conference games. Of course, the only thing that made the rounds was Franklin referring to the SEC as “that other conference.”
That comment made its way all the way up the flagpole to SEC commissioner Greg Sankey.
I mean, need I say more?
OK, how about the fact that Frankin is the last SEC head coach who willingly left the conference for another job? Or what about the fact that he’s 2-4 vs. SEC competition — both of which were wins against Bryan Harsin-led Auburn — during his 11 seasons at Penn State? That’s slightly better than his 4-20 mark vs. AP Top 10 teams during his tenure, yet Franklin could be leading the preseason No. 1 team in America if aforementioned Clemson or Texas doesn’t earn that top spot.
Franklin is a fine coach, but he’s a clear SEC enemy.
Curt Cignetti, Indiana coach
By now, you don’t need me to run through all the issues that SEC fans have with Cignetti. The Indiana coach took aim at the conference by saying that IU canceled the Virginia home-and-home because he wanted to “adopt an SEC scheduling philosophy.” Cignetti should’ve said that he wanted to only have 9 Power Conference games, but decided to swipe at the SEC in an effort to win some PR points. Any SEC fan could push back at Cignetti by saying the conference actually schedules premier nonconference games, and the Big Ten only has 1 fewer FCS game than the SEC in 2025.
Mind you, Cignetti’s squad already got the benefit of the doubt in 2024 by making the Playoff as the 4th Big Ten team while the 4th SEC team was left out of the field. The man who coined the phrase “Google me” is only being talked about for taking a shot at the SEC scheduling when in reality, it was the Big Ten who made the decision to go from 8 to 9 conference games in 2016.
What the world needs is Cignetti facing off with an SEC team in some sort of a meaningful postseason game. Lord knows he’d never allow such a regular season game to happen.
(I realize I could’ve just make this the entire Big Ten)
I didn’t do that because each coach has a specific reason why SEC fans have extra motivation to root against them.
But if you think the Big Ten was confident after finally winning consecutive national championships for the first time since the Lyndon B. Johnson administration, imagine what 3 national titles in a row would do for that.
And one for the road … Rhett Lashlee and his attempts to knock SEC depth
I’m not sure if you heard from Lashlee, but the SEC has only had 6 teams win the conference since 1964 (which means it had 7 teams win the conference since 1963). Thanks to Lashlee for taking that nugget that was handed to him and presenting it to the world as if he were breaking news.
Needless to say, I disagreed with his logic.
In addition to the ACC failing to win a New Year’s 6 Bowl in the 2020s, I could’ve also pointed out how Clemson won 8 of the 11 conference titles during the Playoff era. We’re still waiting on a non-Clemson ACC team to keep it within 27 points in a Playoff game. That includes Lashlee’s SMU squad, who had a remarkable Year 1 in the ACC, but dropped the conference’s New Year’s 6 Bowl/Playoff record to 0-8 in the 2020s.
Lashlee, just like Bielema, Franklin and Cignetti, have all been at least members of SEC staffs in their careers. Lashlee, of course, is a former SEC player (Arkansas). The guy was on Auburn’s staff learning under his former coach, Gus Malzahn, while the SEC was in the midst of winning 7 consecutive national titles by 4 different schools from 2006-12, including the program he was at. To find 4 different ACC schools who won a national title, you’d have to go all the way back to 1953 (Florida State, Clemson, Georgia Tech and Maryland). From 2017-22, the SEC had 3 different schools win national titles. From 1964 (Lashlee’s preferred start date) to now, 3 different ACC schools won national titles.
So yeah, Lashlee isn’t exactly the one who should be throwing shade on all things “conference depth.” Plus, like with Indiana, his program got the benefit of the doubt from the selection committee ahead of those borderline SEC programs. That comment was bizarre.
Maybe Lashlee hasn’t quite earned the right to be an SEC enemy, but let’s just say he hasn’t gained any fans from the conference in the past year.
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.
