The SEC – Great and Getting Greater

2006 was a great season for the SEC, with 9 of 12 teams going to bowl games, 6 of those teams winning, Florida winning the MNC and LSU ending up ranked 3rd (both after 41-14 beat downs of their bowl opponents).

Well SEC haters, you might want to head to your bunkers now. Because if the current recruiting rankings are any indication, the SEC is about to get a whole lot better.

First, here is Scouts.com rankings –

1. Florida
2. Texas
3. LSU
4. Tennessee
5. Notre Dame
6. USC
7. South Carolina
8. Pittsburgh
9. Auburn
10. Nebraska
11. Oregon
12. Illinois
13. Georgia Tech
14. Georgia
15. Michigan
16. West Virginia
17. Virginia Tech
18. California
19. Mississippi
20. Ohio State

7 of the top 20 are SEC schools.

And here is Rivals –

1 Florida
2 Texas
3 Tennessee
4 LSU
5 Notre Dame
6 South Carolina
7 Southern Cal
8 Georgia
9 Auburn
10 Nebraska
11 Oregon
12 Illinois
13 Michigan
14 Clemson
15 Ole Miss
16 Georgia Tech
17 Virginia
18 Penn State
19 Ohio State
20 Virginia Tech

The same 7 schools are top 20, and 6 are actually top 10.

Schools from other conferences (per Scouts)–

ACC – 2 (Georgia Tech top rated at 13th)
Big East –2 (Pitt top rated at 8th)
Big 10 -3 (Illinois top rated at 12th)
Big 12 – 2 (Texas top rated at 2nd)
Pac 10 – 3 (USC top rated at 6th)

In other words, the SEC has as many top recruiting classes as the ACC, Big 12 and Big 10 combined.

Winning big has its advantages, with Florida picking up 2 “5 star” recruits since January 8th, while Ohio State has not had a single commitment of any level since then.

However, all is not lost SEC loathers, as not only will this talent spend all year beating each other up, Florida actually has to play the 6 other SEC schools on this list next season. So, by season’s end, one can expect the media SEC naysayer’s to be in full gear, pointing out the little flaws like close conference games of whatever SEC team has the best record at that point.

Until the SEC mops the field with the little media darlings in the bowl games.