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Urban Meyer knows all about the SEC’s rule over college football for the last several decades.
After all, the 60-year-old Meyer was a part of that dominance, coaching Florida to national titles in 2006 and 2008, right about the time Nick Saban was settling in at Alabama to win 6 championships there. Meyer and Saban were a big part of the stronghold that the SEC had over the sport for the past few decades, but now Meyer believes that stronghold is fading.
In fact, the FOX college football analyst went so far as to say the SEC’s dominance is “over” while breaking down the current state of the sport on the The Triple Option podcast. Meyer believes the Big Ten, where he also won a national title in 2014 while at Ohio State, has passed the SEC. Right now, Big Ten behemoths Ohio State and Penn State are getting ready to play in the College Football Playoff semifinals, while the SEC only clings to conference newcomer Texas as its last hope of having a national champion this season.
“It really wasn’t close, the Georgia game,” said Meyer. “Notre Dame … had better athletes. They were a much better football team. Ohio State-Tennessee, Ohio State had much better athletes than the University of Tennessee. Illinois-South Carolina, Illinois had better athletes than South Carolina. … I’m anxious to see the NFL Draft. I would tell our staff that other than championships, the NFL Draft is the indicator of how you do in recruiting. You can change the helmets on these teams and say these are all SEC teams like it used to be.
“The question is, is the SEC’s dominance over? It is, it’s over. Now, next year is another year. But for two years, it’s over. The Wolverines (last year), it wasn’t even close. … You got Texas right now, but are we really calling Texas a blue-blood in the SEC first year? They’re an underdog at Ohio State. I missed on some things. I was part of the SEC bandwagon, as well. I coached in that conference, and top to bottom, it wasn’t even close when I got to the Big Ten in 2012.”
But all that has changed, Meyer said, at least for now.
[H/T Awful Announcing]
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
