Oklahoma’s Bob Stoops continues to makes waves around the nation with his controversial comments regarding the SEC. Over the past year Stoops has frequently commented to media outlets expressing his thoughts on the perceived SEC dominance in college football. Most recently, Stoops took exception to Alabama Coach Nick Saban calling the 2013-2014 Sugar Bowl a consolation game.
Stoops said, “They didn’t look like it was a consolation game on that first drive when they scored a touchdown and everyone thought they were going to rout us.”
It didn’t appear that Saban intended to insult Oklahoma, rather voice his annoyance with the way in which the BCS system operated. However, Stoops was obviously still bothered by the comments. Along with criticizing coach Saban, who has multiple National Championship rings, Stoops hasn’t shied away from criticizing the SEC as a whole. Stoops claims the idea of SEC dominance stems from a conspiratorial effort by the NCAA, news media, and coaches alike to cater to the primary money makers in college football, which happen to be SEC schools. Stoops concedes that the top of the SEC has dominated the national scene, but cites the struggles of the teams at the bottom of the conference as evidence that the conference as a whole is overrated.
According to Stoops, “So they’ve had the best team in college football. They haven’t had the whole conference. Because, again, half of ’em haven’t done much at all. I’m just asking you. You tell me.”
Stoops comment seems counter intuitive, especially after he conceded that the top ranked SEC teams have been tough for anyone to beat. If the top half of the SEC is beating everyone else’s top half, why would one expect the bottom half of the conference to be able to challenge the big boys. The dominance of the top half of the SEC over the bottom half confirms the evidence that the top half is simply that good not that the bottom half is particularly bad. Just last year the SEC sent 10 of their 14 teams to a bowl game and every team in the bottom half of the league won their respective games. The SEC losses actually came from the top half of the conference, which contradicts Stoop’s point. Even with that said, how teams at the top of a conference perform still counts toward the strength of a conference and should not be an indictment of conference failures.
The facts scream SEC dominance. Auburn fell 13 seconds short of extending the SEC BCS championship streak to eight in a row. The SEC has the best conference winning percentage in BCS games at .630. Also topping the list, the SEC won 9 of 16 total BCS National Championships. Aside from the top tier bowl games, the SEC as a whole has won more total bowl games than any other league in the BCS era. The SEC is 81-55 in non-conference games against schools from leagues that had automatic BCS bowl tie-ins.
Stoops also takes aim at SEC scheduling, “It’s (non-conference schedules are) not real strong, and you’re only playing 8 conference games.”
It is difficult to find where Stoops garners the impression that SEC out of conference is somehow weak. There is no poll that specifically rates out of conference schedules, but according to the 2014-2015 NCAA’s ranking of overall schedules, seven SEC teams are in the top 20. This ranking takes into account the difficulty of the SEC in and of itself, something Stoops would probably be skeptical of altogether. Although Stoops and others criticize the SEC out of conference scheduling, there are numerous examples of SEC schools scheduling quality opponents. Just this year several out of conference matchups include LSU vs. Wisconsin, Georgia vs. Clemson, Alabama vs. West Virginia, and Tennessee vs. Oklahoma just to name a few. Observing the NFL draft validates the SEC’s football success. For eight years in a row NFL franchises drafted more SEC players than any other conference. In the past two years, the SEC blew away every other conference by sending 113 players to the NFL, the next closest team was the ACC with 72.
While believing the NCAA and media outlets are biased, it seems highly doubtful that Stoops would be foolish enough to claim NFL teams are drafting SEC players simply to enliven the SEC’s reputation. Frankly, the NFL could care less where a specific player comes from as they are much more interested in advancing their own team’s agenda. The fact that the SEC has more players drafted, not just in the first round, is just further evidence that the teams themselves are more formidable.
By citing specific anecdotes like his team’s 2013 victory over Alabama in the Sugar Bowl, a year which saw a decline in SEC defensive numbers, Stoops simply shows his ignorance of the big picture. When arguing on the veracity of the SEC’s quality of play one cannot simply say it is propaganda. Citing the SEC’s dominance in bowl games, the regular season, and the NFL draft is not propaganda, rather factual analysis of data. The only point that Stoops may provisionally make is that the SEC’s dominance is occasionally over hyped. The SEC is the best football conference in Division 1 college football and to argue over the degree to which they are the best misses the point completely.
In spite of Stoops’ team’s recent win over Alabama, it does not appear to be in his best interest to make enemies of Nick Saban or any other SEC coach. Coach Stoops, the numbers speak for themselves. For the record, Saban is 14-2 in “revenge games” and with the new four-team playoff system, it wouldn’t be a shock to see Alabama and Oklahoma meet again. If that’s the case, I wouldn’t want to be on the Sooner sideline.
