If you’ve watched any SEC football this season, you understand the disparity between the conference’s two divisions.

The SEC West has five teams ranked in this week’s College Football Playoff Top 25, and the division’s seven teams have combined to lose just once all year to anyone outside the West. The SEC East, meanwhile, has just one team in this week’s rankings, and four more teams with at least four losses this season.

Even the division’s lone ranked program, No. 20 Georgia, is ranked behind five West schools in the CFP Top 25. It’s pretty obvious how much better the West is compared to its East counterpart.

Logically, each division will send one representative to Atlanta on Dec. 6 to compete for the 2014 SEC Championship, but realistically only one division has a chance to earn the conference crown.

The SEC East has about as much of a chance to win the conference championship game as an offensive lineman has to win to win the Heisman Trophy — theoretically it’s not impossible, but it’s obviously not going to happen.

The West has been so dominant this year, it’s hard to imagine anyone from outside the division beating one of the West’s five ranked teams this season, especially not with a conference title on the line. The West champion will likely be playing for a spot in the four-team playoff at season’s end, while the East already knows it won’t have a team in the CFP this year. As a result, the West is not going to blow its opportunity to continue the SEC’s dominance in postseason play during the last decade.

The East has more embarrassing losses than it does impressive victories this season. Missouri lost at home to Indiana, a team otherwise winless against competition from the power five conferences. Georgia has two losses to South Carolina and Florida, a pair of teams with a combined 8-8 record and a combined 5-7 record in SEC play. Florida has already benched its quarterback this season, and its fans have already chanted for their coach to be fired during a Homecoming loss to Missouri, yet the Gators are also still alive to win the East in 2014.

It’s been a comedy of errors in the East, while the West has been a buzz saw for most challengers this season. It seems unlikely anyone from the East has what it takes to beat one of the best teams in the country on a national stage with a championship on the line.

It should be noted the conference championship game is a battle between each division’s best team, not the divisions as a whole. The West’s impeccable depth and the East’s lack thereof won’t have an impact on the Dec.6 showdown in the Georgia Dome. Teams like Vanderbilt will no longer bring down the East, and two-loss powers like LSU and Ole Miss will no longer help strengthen the West.

With that said, the West champion will truly have earned its spot in the title game, needing to win at least 10 games in a division with five top 20 teams and three top 5 teams. The East champion, on the other hand, will be the team that avoids enough catastrophes to come out on top. It’s unfair to say the East champion will win the division by default, but if the SEC abandoned its two-division format and chose its two best teams to square off in Atlanta, no East team would even be under consideration.

There’s a reason they play the games, and sure, the East champion could put forth its best showing of the year in a magical upset. But this is not a “trap game” for the West champion. It’s a championship game, and in those circumstances the favorite rarely allows a heavy underdog to make things interesting.

Barring a complete and utter miracle, the East champion will have to be content with a division championship and an above-average bowl berth. The division is as weak as it has ever been, and the West’s powerhouse teams know this.

So at risk of disrespecting the East, the division has no shot at success beyond the regular season. The East will return to prominence in a year or two on the backs of some young, talented superstars just beginning to emerge, but in 2014 the SEC Championship is the West’s to lose.