Another week, another impressive showing for the SEC elite.
Every SEC team outside of Mississippi State moved up at least 1 spot in the Week 9 Associated Press Top 25. Well, except for No. 1 Alabama because duh.
But with 5 SEC teams on the rise — 3 of whom didn’t even play — there were plenty of takeaways from the latest AP poll:
1. LSU and Alabama will be top-4 teams when they meet in 2 weeks
Getting ahead of myself? You bet I am. Sorry if I have Week 10 circled on my calendar. Why wouldn’t I?
With Ohio State’s loss, LSU moved into the No. 4 spot. That wasn’t the surprising. The Tigers are obviously deserving of the top 1-loss spot. I wouldn’t even have a problem if the Tigers being ranked ahead of Notre Dame. But that won’t happen unless LSU beats Alabama.
So let’s look at that because while all signs point to the Tide being a freight train without any signs of slowing down, this will be a matchup of top-4 teams with both on bye next week. And if the Tigers somehow win, they’d be worthy of that No. 1 spot, regardless of what Clemson or Notre Dame do.
We’re going to head into November with LSU having 4 wins vs. top-25 teams, 3 of which were by at least 16 points. Go figure. Nobody in America can claim that. Can you imagine if LSU added a win against No. 1 Alabama to that?
OK, I’m getting wayyyyy ahead of myself.
2. But speaking of a pair of top-10 teams…
I definitely didn’t predict Georgia (No. 7) AND Florida (No. 9) being top-10 teams when they met in Year 1 of the Dan Mullen era. But the Gators moved into the top 10 all the way up to No. 9. The bye week further solidified a résumé that’s looking even better after LSU rose into the top 4.
What was significant about that? Florida leap-frogged UCF, which sat at No. 10. The Gators are now back to being the top-ranked team in the state of Florida. A win over Georgia would make the path to Atlanta look a whole lot clearer, but that’s obviously far from a given against the defending national runner-ups.
There’s no way that I wouldn’t guessed Mullen’s team would be in this spot in late-October, particularly because of the offensive overhaul needed. The offense is far from a finished product, yet it’s ranked fifth in the SEC in 35th nationally. That’s a good sign moving forward, regardless of if Florida upsets Georgia.
The Gators don’t have the makeup of a team that’s in for a free-fall anytime soon.
3. It’s still the SEC vs. everyone else
Despite the fact that Mississippi State fell out of the top-25, the SEC still has 6 of the top 16 teams.
- No. 1 Alabama
- No. 4 LSU
- No. 7 Georgia
- No. 9 Florida
- No. 12 Kentucky
- No. 16 Texas A&M
Here’s a little perspective on that. Combine the ACC and B1G and they have 6 ranked teams in the entire top-25. Ah, here’s something else. The SEC has the top-ranked unbeaten team (Alabama), the top-ranked 1-loss team (LSU) and the second-highest ranked 2-loss team (Texas A&M).
Want more? OK, how about the fact that the SEC has 5 teams with 1 or fewer losses. Compare that to the rest of the Power 5 conferences:
- ACC — 2 (Clemson, NC State)
- Big 12 — 3 (Oklahoma, Texas, West Virginia)
- Big Ten — 3 (Iowa, Michigan, Ohio State)
- Pac-12 — 1 (Washington State)
That’s why the SEC has such a top-heavy presence in the AP poll. It’s pretty simple. And by the way, Texas A&M was the only one of those teams with a non-conference loss and it was a down-to-the-wire game against Clemson. That won’t be lost on the selection committee when the first poll comes out a week from Tuesday.
The Danny Kanells of the world can continue to cry foul about the SEC being overrated, but the numbers don’t lie.
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.
