Southern football up North

When Bear Bryant returned to Alabama as head coach in 1958 the Southeastern Conference was already a tough place to win. The schools were a part of the fabric of their cities and states, just as they are today. Every road game was a trip to a hostile environment and the teams played hard.

          But even so, one of the SEC coaches said a few years later, “Bear Bryant has made every coach in the SEC put his golf clubs away.”

          Today, the SEC has claimed its seventh straight national football championship. The state of Alabama has won its fourth straight national title.

          Roll Tide.

          To understand why the SEC is so successful in football, you have to understand the South. You have to understand how hard it is to play in those raucous stadiums, even where the home school has had an unsuccessful season. You have to understand what a rivalry is and how every SEC game is a rivalry game.

          It has always been that way in the SEC, but back when titles were decided by polls, regional prejudice played a part in determining the vote. When college football was televised by one network and the rule was a school could only host one national TV game a season, football fans away from the South did not have an understanding of life in the SEC. I guess they do now.

          But, just as Bryant forced his fellow conference coaches to give up golf all those years ago, Urban Meyer is about to do the same to the coaches in the Big 10 (why they still call it the Big 10, I have no idea). The Big 10 now has a former SEC champ in its midst and college football is about to change.

          Ohio State was undefeated this season, but the Buckeyes were not eligible to play in a bowl game. They’ll be bowl eligible in 2013 and should probably be among the favorites to earn a berth in the national championship game.

          Meyer is a relentless recruiter and a tremendous coach, much like Alabama’s current coach, Nick Saban. Saban is the only coach to have won BCS championships at two schools, having won at LSU before he came to Alabama. Meyer might become the second because he is that good a coach and he’s at a great football school.

          But that’s all in the future. We’ll see what happens.

 

          For now, thanks for reading and Roll Tide!!