When the SEC and Big XII announced that they would be partnering up to create their own new “Champions Bowl,” it marked a new day in the history of college football’s bowl system.  A good day for conferences and schools.  A bad day for bowl games.

Eventually, the Sugar Bowl beat out the Cotton Bowl to become the “Champions Bowl” (which will first be played in 2014).  The top teams from the SEC and Big XII not already in the College Football Playoff will meet in New Orleans.  For the first time, the vast majority of revenue from a bowl game will go to the leagues, not the game.

More conferences are now mulling whether or not to create their own games or — as the SEC and Big XII have done in New Orleans — partially take over an existing one.  So why make such a massive shift in the college football bowl structure?  Just look to this past year’s Sugar Bowl.

In January an 11-1 Florida team was invited to New Orleans to play Louisville.  The Gators appeared no more excited about facing the Cardinals than their fans did about watching that game.  Louisville won the contest.  Few UF fans showed up in the Superdome to witness it.

Florida sold fewer than 7,000 of the 17,500 tickets that were allotted to the school.  “Allotted” is an interesting word when it comes to bowl talk.  While it sounds like a gift of some sort, the reality is that Florida was on the hook to buy each of those 17,500 tickets.  Meaning the school had to eat about 10,000 tickets.  And that played a large role in Florida losing $840,000 for its trip to last season’s Sugar Bowl.

Some reward.

As it negotiates new contracts with all of its existing bowl partners — and potential new bowl partners — the SEC is pushing for lower ticket guarantees.  That change has already been built into the new playoff.  The major bowls in the College Football Playoff will require only 12,500 tickets to be sold rather than the 17,500 required by the Sugar Bowl.

Once the new SEC/Big XII co-owned Sugar Bowl launches after next season, the leagues will have a working model to represent their vision a new conference-bowl relationship.  That will give the biggest conferences even more leverage over the bowls and — if the game’s a money-maker — even more incentive to rejigger the entire college football bowl system.

SEC Football

1. Baylor coach Art Briles on SEC dominance: “They’ve put their brand on the table and they’ve walked away with all the chips.”

2. At 6-1, Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel is Danny Sheridan’s favorite to win the Heisman but Alabama’s T.J. Yeldon and Georgia’s Aarron Murray aren’t far behind.

3. Sheridan has Alabama as the favorite to the win the SEC and the BCS title.

4. Alabama, Florida and Texas A&M dominate Athlon’s All-SEC teams with double-digit selections.  Georgia and Ole Miss not far behind with nine each.

5. Is Tennessee a trap game for Auburn?

6. When Miami celebrated winning the NBA title last year, Tennessee coach Butch Jones was in the locker room. He’s a friend of Heat coach Erik Spoelstra.

7. What the future looks like for Ole Miss sophomore cornerback Anthony Standifer and senior guard Jared Duke.

8. Five JUCO transfers that could make an impact in the SEC this fall.

9. Former LSU quarterback Tommy Hodson hasn’t played in 24 years but he’s still  the school’s career passing yardage leader.

SEC/College News

10. NCAA Committee on Infractions meeting today in Indianapolis regarding the Miami investigation. Frank Haith is ready.

11. Auburn says it spent more than $1 million trying to save Toomer’s Oaks.  It wants restitution from Harvey Updyke, Jr. but his attorney calls the request “excessive.”

12. Howard’s Rock at Clemson vandalized earlier this month. Police have fingerprints.

13. Southern Cal offers 8th-grade wide receiver.  He accepts - ”I said yes right away,”

14. Not to be outdone, UCLA has offered an 8th-grade quarterback.

15. University of Missouri chancellor Brady Deaton steppping down.  A.D. Mike Alden: “He’s as good a person as I’ve ever worked with.”

16. Kentucky A.D. Mitch Barnhart says Louisville had a “nice year.”  John Clay: “It’s like saying Nate Silver can count.”

17. Bowl game coming to Little Rock?

SEC Basketball

18. Coal tax money will be used to renovate Rupp Arena in Lexington.  Coal-country officials aren’t happy about it.

19. Promotions on the Alabama staff include Sean Dwyer going from video coordinator to special assistant to the head coach.

20. Future looking brighter at Mississippi State?

21. Knoxville summer league features six teams – all with a Tennessee connection.

22. Some mid-major programs are also the beneficiaries of tougher SEC scheduling.

Extras

23. Theories on why some former Nick Saban players at Alabama have struggled in the NFL.

Talk about your thankless jobs.

With so many people worried about the heat members of the new college football playoff selection committee will take, there’s already an important figure in collegiate sports who’s got it far worse than any playoff panelist — NCAA president Mark Emmert.

Emmert took the reigns of the NCAA more than two years ago.  Today he’s been riddled with more bullets (verbal in nature) than Sonny Corleone at a tollbooth.  Coaches don’t like the NCAA because its rulebook is too thick.  Fans don’t like the NCAA because the organization is basically the police force of college sports and if their favorite school is cheating in some way, well, they don’t want them to get caught.  Media members attack the NCAA because that’s just what we do.  We look at big organizations and attempt to critique them, often in unfair ways.

And if happen to be the poor sap who’s agreed to sit atop the NCAA’s org chart — as Emmert has — then you’re the guy that coaches, fans and media members will target most often.

This week, Sports Illustrated is running a lengthy story on the overall failure of Emmert to reform the NCAA during his tenure.  (Of course, when he’s attempted to actually reform the rulebook, the changes have all been ixnayed after the fact by coaches and athletic directors who were not consulted).  Among the many negative reviews of Emmert and his team from SI.com:

*  “In many interviews with NCAA officials about enforcement, the topic quickly shifted back to the leadership of Emmert, who is known internally at the NCAA as the ‘King of the Press Conference.’  That’s not a compliment.”

*  “A portrait emerged of a (enforcement) department battered by turnover, afraid of lawsuits and overwhelmed by scandal.  One ex-enforcement official told SI, ‘The time is ripe to cheat.  There’s no policing going on.’”

*  “When talking to a dozen college officials to get a pulse on Emmert, many struggled to answer the question, ‘What has he actually accomplished so far in his tenure?’  Even the harsh sanctions against Penn State in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal ($60 million fine, four-year bowl ban and the loss of 40 scholarships over four years) has painted Emmert in a bad light after he went on a television tour, which some perceived as a victory lap, to talk about the unprecedented action by the NCAA.”

*  “The NCAA failed to pass most of the initiatives Emmert has trumpeted.  Many agreed with the ideals behind Emmert’s ambitious agenda, including trying to give scholarship athletes a small amount of money to cover the full cost of school, and paring down the rulebook.  But the lack of results have highlighted the growing schism between have and have-nots in Division I and further polarized the athletic directors who feel largely ignored and highlighted how out-of-touch Emmert is with his constituents.”

Yikes.  It goes on from there and it gets no prettier.

Not to be outdone, The Sporting News put in some calls of its own to further pile on the easy-target NCAA president:

*  “Why does embattled president Mark Emmert still have a job?  The reason could be this simple: Firing Emmert could do more harm than good.  ‘If you force him out, you’re essentially telling everyone he has failed,’ one NCAA (university) president told Sporting News.  ‘When you’re dealing with (litigation), it’s not prudent to admit failure at the highest office.’”

*  “‘He is incapable of looking in the mirror and figuring out that he could be the problem,’ one administrator of a BCS school told Sporting News.  ‘A leader with a personality like that, it affects everyone he manages and it affects the way the organization is run.’”

The real problem might just be that reforming the NCAA is a goal that cannot be accomplished, a game that can’t be won.  Sci-fi heads, think “Kobayashi Maru,” the ultimate no-win scenario.

Read the rest of this entry »

When it comes to pastries, no SEC school takes as many trips to the corner bakery as Ole Miss.  Over the past five years, the Rebels have played a whopping six schools from the FCS level.  Worse, their non-conference schedule has featured just two schools — two in five years — from BCS automatic-qualifier conferences (ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big XII, and Pac-12).

No one in the SEC — not even Mississippi State — has feasted on as many cupcakes and creampuffs as the gang from Oxford.  And MSU has nibbled on its share of sponge cake.

On the other end of the spectrum are Vanderbilt and Georgia.  Some might say that the BCS-level foes they’ve scheduled haven’t always been atop their conferences, but at least they’re playing power-conference competition.  Both schools have scheduled 10 games against squads from BCS automatic-qualifiers over the last five seasons.

For comparison’s sake, we’ve gone back through the 2008 season to see which SEC schools have done the best and worst jobs of non-conference scheduling.  We’ve decided to include Missouri and Texas A&M even though they’ve spent just one year in the SEC.  But keep in mind the Big XII played nine league games in 2011.  So both A&M and Mizzou faced one less non-conference foe between ’08 and ’12 than their new SEC roomies.

In addition, please remember that those recent matchups between Texas A&M and Arkansas were non-conference games until last season.

One last note: We’re well aware of the schedule quirks, broken contracts, and state legislators’ desires that have forced your favorite school to line up games with tin cans on occasion.  And to paraphrase a Tommy Lee Jones’ line from “The Fugitive,” we don’t care.  Below is a simple look at how the SEC’s teams have handled non-conference scheduling in recent years.  It is what it is.

The categories used are “actual competition” (BCS conference foes), “cannon fodder” (teams from non-AQ FBS leagues or independents), and “cupcakes” (FCS-level opponents).

Enjoy…

Alabama

Actual Competition: 6 — Clemson, Duke, Michigan, Penn State (2), Virginia Tech

Cannon Fodder: 10 — Arkansas State, Florida Atlantic, Florida International, Kent State, North Texas (2), San Jose State, Tulane, Western Kentucky (2)

Cupcakes: 4 — Georgia State, Georgia Southern, UT-Chattanooga, Western Carolina

Thoughts: Nick Saban has been pushing the SEC to add another conference game.  He’s also in favor power-conference teams playing only other power-conference teams.  But he’s not an idiot.  Until everyone gets on the same page, he won’t be trying to lead the way with Bama’s schedule.  Still, he’s been more than willing to open seasons against name competition.

2013 Schedule: Virginia Tech, Colorado State, Georgia State, UT-Chattanooga

Arkansas

Actual Competition: 5 — Rutgers, Texas, Texas A&M (3)

Cannon Fodder: 10 — Eastern Michigan, Louisiana-Monroe (3), New Mexico, Troy (2), Tulsa (2), UTEP

Cupcakes: 5 — Jacksonville State, Missouri State (2), Tennessee Tech, Western Illinois

Thoughts: Meh.  The Hogs haven’t exactly lined up the best of the best of the best over the last few years.  (Hey, another line from a Tommy Lee Jones’ flick.)  Texas and pre-SEC Texas A&M were good games, but Arkansas’ cannon fodder games were truly that.  Then you toss in five games against FCS cupcakes.  Was any Razorback fan happy to plunk down cash to see any of the last 10 schools on that list?  Happily Bret Bielema and AD Jeff Long are locking up future non-conference games against quality foes from the Hogs’ old Southwest Conference days.

2013 Schedule: Louisiana-Lafayette, Samford, Southern Miss, Rutgers

Auburn

Actual Competition: 5 — Clemson (3), West Virginia (2)

Cannon Fodder: 10 — Arkansas State, Ball State, Florida Atlantic, Louisiana-Monroe (3), Louisiana Tech, New Mexico State, Southern Miss, Utah State

Cupcakes: 5 — Alabama A&M, Furman, Samford, UT-Chattanooga, UT-Martin

Thoughts: The same as above.  Auburn had five marquee non-conference games in the last five years.  Their remaining 15 non-conference contests were dreck.  This year’s non-con slate looks to provide more of the same.

2013 Schedule: Washington State, Arkansas State, Western Carolina, Florida Atlantic

Read the rest of this entry »

SEC Football

1. What stands out on the Tennesse roster?  ”Lack of experience. Only 15 players have started more than 10 games…”

2. Budget for football at Kentucky will increase more than $3 million in the coming year. Big chunk is increased coaching salaries.

3. What’s the word on Ole Miss freshman running back Kailo Moore?  ”Blindingly fast.”

4. What’s the biggest challenge facing first-year Arkansas coach Bret Bielema?  The schedule.

5. Florida quartertback Jeff Driskel surprised to get selected in the MLB draft: “Did not see that coming.”

6. Florida-Georgia on November 2 - “might as well be circled in blood this season.”

7. Kevin Scarbinsky on the Alabama-Auburn rivalry: “In short, for the Tide, the Tigers are a means to an end. For the Tigers, the Tide is the be-all and end-all.”

8. Matt Hayes at The Sporting News says Gus Malzahn one of three coaches who will win immediately in his new job.

9. Looking like the race for quarterback at Auburn is down to four candidates: ”Jason Smith from McGill-Toolen is likely headed to prep school.”

10. Video games mimic real life.  Alabama dominates EA Sports’ NCAA Football 14. One hardcore fan put every rating into a sortable spreadsheet.

11.  Any takers? At just one dollar under a million - a ticket for Alabama/Texas A&M.

SEC Basketball

11. Incoming Florida freshman Chris Walker still has work to do to be eligible for this coming season.

12. That was quick.  Jerome Seagears transferred from Rutgers to Auburn this summer.  Now he’s told coaches he’s leaving to be closer to his family in Maryland.

13. Missouri assistant coach Rick Carter is leaving, reportedly headed to Xavier. Former Missouri coach Quin Snyder joining the staff of the Atlanta Hawks.

14. “The longest-tenured power conference coaches without an NCAA round of 16 appearance are Mississippi’s Andy Kennedy and Arizona State’s Herb Sendek.”

15, Tennessee’s Jeronne Maymon on sitting out last season with a knee injury.  ”You see things differently. Things you don’t see while you’re out there playing, you see.”

16. John Calipari’s advice to young players: “What you should be spending 90 percent of your time on is getting their feel for the ball, bouncing it with their head up…”

College News

17. Goodbye domes prior to college basketball’s Final Four?

18. There are 18 Division I teams banned from postseason.

19. One day after his father said he’d prefer Southern Cal, five-star linebacker Matthew Thomas will end playing at Florida State after all.

20. Former Syracuse basketball assistant coach Bernie Fine reportedly suing ESPN for $11 million.

21. Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany signs an extension that will keep him around through June of 2018.

Extras

22. Interested in a college basketball fantasy camp in Las Vegas?  It will set you back $7,500.

23. Marcus Lattimore paid $20,000 to record two ads for the lottery in South Carolina.

24.  If they do this for a victory, what would San Antonio Spurs fan do if they win the series?

25. Major League Baseball opening in Sydney, Australia next year?

Earlier this week we brought you a quick comment from SEC scheduling czar Larry Templeton regarding the issues faced by the league when trying to build a schedule that pleases everyone.  Now commissioner Mike Slive has weighed in on the topic and he, too, makes it clear that scheduling isn’t as easy as most fans and media members believe:

“We try one (scenario), and there’s a knot.  We try another one, and there’s a big knot — whether it’s permanent (games), whether it’s traditional game or whether it’s too many games.  At some point in time, we’re going to have to unravel one of those knots and just make a decision.”

When the knots are unraveled, we expect — as we’ve written for years — that the league will move to a nine-game schedule featuring a 6-1-2 rotation with the league mandating that a 10th game be played against a school from a power conference.

Want to know what a football program must do to score highly on the NCAA’s academic progress reports?  First, get kids to class.  That’s obvious.  Second, make sure those football players get consistent leadership from someone they respect.

The NCAA released the latest round of football APR numbers yesterday — the scores are a four-year rolling average from 2008-09 through 2011-12 — and here’s how the SEC’s schools fared:

1.  Missouri 982 — The league’s newest member lived up to its AAU reputation in Year One.  Gary Pinkel has been at Mizzou for more than a decade.

2.  Alabama 978 — Not bad for a BCS champ, no?  Nick Saban has been coaching (and winning) in Tuscaloosa since 2007.

3.  Vanderbilt 973 — Would you expect anything less from Vandy?  The Commodores had three coaches between 2008 and 2012, but, again, it’s Vanderbilt.

4t.  Florida 968 — Another AAU school.  Very good numbers despite one coaching transition.

4t.  Georgia 968 — Not an AAU member but certainly one of the SEC’s more respected academic institutions.  Also, Mark Richt has been running the UGA program for more than a decade.

6.  Mississippi State 967 — Dan Mullen has been at State since 2009.

7.  South Carolina 966 — Steve Spurrier is entering his ninth season in Columbia.

8.  Texas A&M 954 — One coaching change, outside this window.

9.  Auburn 950 — Another school with a coaching change this past season.

10t.  LSU 944 — Les Miles has been in Baton Rouge for nearly a decade, so this number is a bit surprising.  However, the Tigers have had a large number of NFL early-entrants in recent years.

10t.  Ole Miss 944 — Houston Nutt entered in 2008 and exited after 2011.  That’s basically two coaching changes within this APR window.

12.  Kentucky 943 — Two coaching changes overall including this past offseason.

13.  Arkansas 938 — Bobby Petrino gave way to John L. Smith who’s given way to Bret Bielema his offseason.

14.  Tennessee 924 — Since 2008, UT has been coached by Phillip Fulmer, Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley and now Butch Jones.  The Volunteers are below the 925 penalty-line, but Jones and the school are already working to improve the program’s academic scores.

Bottom line?  Stability at the top of the program leads to stability throughout the program.  Coaching changes lead to transfers and that impacts APR scores.  It’s no surprise that — for the most part — the programs with the SEC’s highest APR results have had the least amount of coaching turnover.  That works in reverse as well.

On a sidenote, many coaches and athletic directors have APR- or other academic-related bonuses built into their contracts.  Carolina’s Spurrier will get an extra $100,000 for his program’s score.  LSU’s Miles missed out on a $200,000 bonus because of the Tigers’ low number, but he can still earn extra scratch if a good percentage of his players reach a specific GPA level or graduate on time.

In the end, there was no need for added security when Alabama coach Nick Saban visited Athens, Tennessee for a speaking engagement last night.  More seats, more water and more Gatorade, on the other hand, would have been handy.

After about a hundred complaints from Volunteer fans, the Athens Area Chamber of Commerce’s benefit dinner was so packed that the line of fans stretched more than a city block a full hour before Saban grabbed the mic under large tent.

Fans from Alabama, Georgia and, of course, Tennessee were in attendance and a smattering of Vol supporters — in the words of The Knoxville News Sentinel’s Evan Woodberry — “mingled comfortably with the hordes in crimson.”  According to Andrew Gribble of The Birmingham News, 900 of the 1,500 tickets sold were snapped up by out-of-state residents with one group traveling all the way from Michigan to hear Saban speak.

Among the coach’s comments on the night:

*  “I don’t really know that much about Butch (Jones), but I have a lot of respect for him.  He’s had success everywhere he’s been.  I’ve got a lot of respect for the University of Tennessee.”

*  “I’m not going to talk a lot about football.  I’m going to talk about how you win.  There’s no way you can be a good leader if you’re not willing to serve other people.”

*  “Mediocre people don’t like high-achievers and high-achievers don’t like mediocre people.  I know I’m old fashioned, but I believe it, it works for me, and that’s why I have success.”

*  “We’ve been up here several times and we do some things for people.  This is not about Tennessee.  This is not about Alabama.  It’s about what we do for people.  We try to support charities and we’re here to support the chamber today.”

*  “This is a lot like the town I grew up in, filled with a lot of people with down-to-earth values.  A lot of great people just like you in that town kept me on the straight and narrow.  And you’re doing that for somebody right now, even if you don’t know it.”

The Chattanooga Times Free Press also filed a report on Saban’s speech.  Fifteen-hundred people, busloads from far off states, and multiple newspapers and television stations covering the event.  That’s a pretty good tent revival by anybody’s definition.

Sports Illustrated’s Andy Staples has today ranked all of the major conference realignment moves that have taken place in the past three seasons.  The best move?  Texas A&M’s to the SEC.  Among the many reasons the Aggies’ move got an A grade from Staples:

“… this union was a perfect cultural fit.  Fans at other Big 12 schools considered the buzzcut-sporting, whooping Aggies a tad odd.  Most SEC fan bases believe there’s something wrong with a school if its fans aren’t odd.  The Longhorns, who have the quietest 100,000 fans in America on fall Saturdays, look down on the Aggies.  Florida, LSU and Alabama fans just said, ‘Welcome to the Party.’”

But Staples’ take on Missouri — he gave the Tigers’ move a C — is a bit more interesting:

“One bad football season does not make this a terrible move.  Remember, in the preceding five years, Missouri was much better at football than Texas A&M.  The Tigers certainly need to get better on the football field — because their new rivals in the SEC East aren’t getting any worse — but calling this move a mistake because of one lousy football season is premature.  If, in 10 years, Missouri has not moved out of the SEC’s cellar, then feel free to say that the Tigers traded a world of pain for the financial security of the SEC.

As far as the SEC goes, Missouri was the only choice everyone could agree upon in the situation the league faced in 2012.  Some presidents and athletic directors wanted Florida State, but they faced fierce opposition from a bloc led by Florida and Georgia.  The most logical additions would have been Virginia Tech or NC State — which would have been geographic fits that opened new television markets — but neither wanted to leave the ACC.  Missouri was geographically contiguous and added two decent-sized television markets (St. Louis and Kansas City).  It also gave the SEC another AAU member.  Of course, if (former Ohio State president) Gordon Gee is to be believed, the Big Ten will try to snatch Missouri down the road.  That would be interesting, but it seems highly unlikely.”

Technically, Gee said that he would have liked to have added Missouri and Kansas already and that he could see that “potentially” happening in the future.  Gee is also known for making bizarro comments from far out in left field.  We at MrSEC.com don’t believe he was anymore speaking for Jim Delany and the Big Ten with regards to Missouri than he was when he made a poor joke about Catholics.

To a more interesting topic, the SEC’s expansion plans post-A&M were and are still shrouded in mystery.  Word leaked out quickly that Missouri and the SEC were playing footsie (as we had suggested might happen way back in the summer of 2010).  As for all the other schools mentioned, well, that depends on each writer’s sources.

Oklahoma was mentioned as a potential candidate because Mike Slive had spoken with Sooner brass a year earlier.  We don’t believe there was much to that.

Folks close to West Virginia University will tell you that Slive and Mountaineer AD Oliver Luck were secretly hoping Missouri would pass on the SEC and leave the door open for WVU.  The problem there?  If the SEC wanted the Mountaineers why didn’t Slive and company just invite them in the first place?

NC State and Virginia Tech were kicked around by several websites as potential targets should the SEC drive toward 16 schools at some point.  But at MrSEC, we never heard much talk about the two — aside from fan chatter — during the push to 14.

Several sources have said that Slive has longed for North Carolina and Duke for ages.  One ACC source even claimed to The Sporting News that the SEC commissioner had been wooing those schools for several years.  Obviously, if wooing went on, that wooing did not work.

Florida State would have been a brand name “get” — much like the Big Ten’s addition of Nebraska — but the SEC was more interested in growing its footprint in 2011 and adding cable households to its portfolio.  Only this offseason have we learned that FSU officials approached SEC officials — in 2013, according to reports — to see if the league Florida State once spurned might still have an interest in the school.  That answer was no.

The fact of the matter is we’ll likely never know for sure just who the SEC did speak with — either officially or unofficially — during the summer and fall of 2011.  What we do know is that Texas A&M and Missouri were the final choices.  And it will take a number of years to determine whether or not the SEC, A&M and Mizzou are a good match long-term.

The Southeastern Conference has found a new coordinator for its men’s basketball officials and it didn’t have to go too far to find him.  Jake Bell has served as the head of officials for the Atlantic Sun Conference and the Southern Atlantic Association.  Prior to his leap into a supervisory role, Bell served as an official in the SEC.

“To be part of the SEC again is a dream opportunity for me,” Bell said in a conference press release.  “I feel so please to be part of such a great organization.”

Bell will replace Gerald Boudreaux whose contract was not renewed by the league after an eight-season run.

One negative about Bell’s hiring?  He’s from Lexington, Kentucky and received a graduate degree from UK in 2003.  And if you don’t think some conspiracy theorist will bring that up every time a block/charge call favors Kentucky’s favor you’re kidding yourself.