SEC Football Kickoff Media Days are set for July 17-20 at the Grand Hyatt in Nashville, TN. It will be the first time the event is held in Nashville and the third time it will be held outside of the Birmingham, AL metro area. It was in Atlanta in 2018 and last year.
No school has won three straight major poll national championships and despite losing 41% of its overall production, according to ESPN’s Bill Connelly, the Georgia Bulldogs seek to become the first to accomplish the feat.
As for winning the SEC Football championship, ESPN Analytics gives Georgia the highest chance of winning the conference title. The Bulldogs are seeking their second straight league crown and third since Kirby Smart took over in 2016 (2017 & 2022).
SEC Football Fun Facts
The ESPN Analytics numbers align fairly closely with Caesars Sportsbook, which has Georgia as the odds-on favorite to win the conference (-115) with Alabama (+240) and LSU (+450) the only other schools with better than 10-1 odds.
The 2023 season will be the final one with divisions for the SEC as the conference will eliminate them in 2024 with the arrival of the Oklahoma Sooners and Texas Longhorns to the league.
Georgia and Alabama are the ESPN Analytics favorites to win the SEC East and West, respectively, and reach the conference championship game.
Seven SEC Football teams are in the FPI top 25, the most of any conference. Twelve of the SEC’s 14 teams have a better than a 50% chance of reaching bowl eligibility according to ESPN Analytics.
As for recruiting, Alabama and Georgia have the top-2 ranked signing classes for this season with LSU coming in at No. 6. Oklahoma and Texas, which will join the SEC in 2024, also have top-5 classes.
SEC Football Team Schedules This Week
Monday: LSU, Missouri and Texas A&M
Tuesday: Auburn, Georgia, Mississippi State and Vanderbilt
Wednesday: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida and Kentucky
Thursday: Ole Miss, South Carolina and Tennessee
I will be doing previews all week for every team starting today with LSU, Missouri, and Texas A/M. More on this later on Shemon and Sheppard.
LSU Tigers
Last year, Brian Kelly became the fourth head coach to lead a team to the SEC Championship Game in his first season at the school.
This season, he will try to do something only one of those coaches on that list did, which was return to the championship game in his second season.
There’s another coaching trend that is more favorable for Kelly and that’s seeking to become the fourth straight coach to lead LSU to a national championship.
Only five coaches during the BCS/College Football Playoff era (since 1998) have won the national championship within their first two seasons at a school.
The last to do it was Gene Chizik, who was in his second season at Auburn when he led his Tigers to the national title in 2010.
Missouri Tigers
Missouri enters its 4th year under Eliah Drinkwitz, seeking its first winning season since 2018 and first bowl win since 2014. The only SEC school with longer droughts between winning seasons and bowl wins is Vanderbilt, who last accomplished both in 2013.
Missouri started 2-4 last year but won four of its last six games to reach bowl eligibility. Three of its four losses to begin the year were by seven points or fewer, tied for the most such losses in FBS through Week 6.
Among the close losses was a four-point loss against Georgia, a game in which the Tigers led the Bulldogs for over 45 minutes of game time (the longest time Georgia spent trailing last season).
Last season, the Missouri offense averaged 24.9 points and 369.8 yards per game, both were its worst marks in a season since 2015. Things have been far worse offensively against SEC opponents.
The Tigers have failed to score at least 30 points against a conference opponent in 10 straight games (last: vs. South Carolina on Nov. 13, 2021), the longest active streak in the SEC.
Texas A/M Aggies
Guaranteeing a lucrative, long-term contract to an offensive-minded head coach does not guarantee a prolific offense. Things did not go as planned for Jimbo Fisher’s attack last season.
Texas A&M scored a TD on just 20% of its offensive drives, the worst rate in the SEC.
Enter new offensive coordinator Bobby Petrino, the former Louisville and Arkansas head coach who comes to College Station after leading FCS Missouri State over the previous 3 seasons.
Fisher and the Aggies hope Petrino can replicate the kind of success from many of his Louisville teams over the last decade. With Lamar Jackson doing much of the damage for the Cardinals, Louisville averaged 6.9 yards per play from the 2015-17 seasons; only Oklahoma (7.5) was better over that span.
Is Conner Weigman the long-term answer at QB?
For his part, the sophomore had 8 Pass TD to 0 Int in his 4 games last season (2-2 as a starter). Weigman struggled mightily in a 13-10 loss at Auburn, completing just 14-of-36 passes for 121 yards, but he went on to toss a pair of TD in a 38-23 win over 5th-ranked LSU to close out the season.
ED ORGERON TO NORTHWESTERN FOOTBALL ?
Ed Orgeron to Northwestern Football ? Sounds strange right? Maybe not.
On Monday, Northwestern University fired its long time football coach and alumni, Pat Fitzgerald. This followed a brief suspension after an alleged hazing scandal emerged from the school's football program. During his 17 years at the school, Fitzgerald had three 10-win seasons and two 9-win seasons at a school that has been notoriously bad at football. In fact, as recently as 2020 he had the Wildcats in the Big 10 Championship game. That never happens!
School President Michael Schill promoted defensive coordinator David Braun to acting head coach. It was the only move he could make because he just arrived in Evanston a few months ago and would be the least likely coach to have been part of the hazing culture at Northwestern. It is assumed he will be named the interim head coach soon. After all, Big 10 Media Days are less than two weeks away.
WHAT?!
There are some that would like Northwestern to look outside the walls of its program and hire a "big-name" coach for the program. And, Wednesday, a big name coach let it be known he is interested in taking over the Wildcats football team: Former LSU coach Ed Orgeron!
Orgeron famously led Joe Burrow and LSU to an undefeated season and a national championship in 2019. Two .500 seasons later he was fired and hasn't coached since.
He's 61 years old and seems like he wants to coach some more. The question is: Why at Northwestern? And, is it a good fit for Northwestern?
Ed Orgeron to Northwestern - PROS AND CONS!
Here are some pro arguments:
Orgeron is a household name. He can coach. And he is a great recruiter. We all saw his recruiting skills on display when he recruited Sandra Bullock in "The Blind Side," right?
Some con arguments:
Northwestern just fired a coach for allegedly looking the other way during a hazing scandal. Orgeron was once accused of looking the other way when one of his players was accused of sexual assault. Also, Northwestern is an academic school. It's sort of the Harvard of the Big 10. Orgeron doesn't seem like a coach who's first priority is the classroom...for better or worse. Also, while at LSU, there were stories of Orgeron's personal life spilling over to practice, although many players refute that.
So, do you still think; Ed Orgeron to Northwestern is crazy? We are just a month and a half from the college football season and it's already promising to be one of the most interesting yet!
