SEC Dominance?

[thwgjacket]

They gave Waller forward progress.

When a guy fights to get out of bounds under 2 min they should give it to him. Herbstreit agreed.

 

[WreckinGT]

I keep hearing the 4-0 thing brought up a lot, and while that was a great moment in time for our conference, it doesn't really tell the tale. First off, we actually went 4-1 vs. the SEC this year, not 4-0 as Clemson's loss to Georgia was every bit as legitimate as the other games. Secondly, all 5 of the inter-conference games involved the ACC's Top 4 teams by Sagarin (1. FSU, 2. GT, 3. Clemson x2, 4. Louisville) while on average we faced a below average slate from the SEC (4. Georgia x2, 10. Florida, 12. South Carolina, 13. Kentucky). Can you imagine if the shoe was on the other foot and the 5 games were (1. Alabama, 2. Ole Miss, 3. Mississippi State x2, 4. Georgia) facing off against (4. Louisville x2, 10. Pittsburgh, 12. North Carolina, 13. Syracuse)? If we went 1-4 in those matchups, we'd consider ourselves lucky.

The SEC has had no problem claiming dominance in the past when their highly ranked teams beat mediocre ACC teams. They even touted Vandy's wins over Wake Forest. When GT and Clemson were winning 6 or 7 games a few years ago, I never heard ESPN claiming that the the wins didn't matter because GT and Clemson were mid level ACC teams. Each year is different. If you want to claim that your conference is dominant then all the games matter. Not just the ones your very top teams play every year.

 

[Animal02]

When a guy fights to get out of bounds under 2 min they should give it to him. Herbstreit agreed.

But the defender was fighting to keep him in bounds...it is all part of the game

 

[thwgjacket]

But the defender was fighting to keep him in bounds...it is all part of the game

So when they're both fighting and one wins we ignore that? I have no faith in any forward progress argument after our game in Athens.

 

[danny daniel]

They gave Waller forward progress.

Lately the refs have let runners fight for first downs and the goal line but did not let Waller fight for the sidelines. The inconsistently in this case was clear.

 

[iggymcfly]

1. You fundamentally misunderstand the nature of betting markets. The house seeks to take zero net position. Despite all the semi-mystical horse**** being passed around about the wisdom of crowds, cfb is very close to a structurally even information market.

Think about this: who do you think bets more money if they think their team will win: Tech and Stanford grads or Bama fans and nad lickers?

The college football betting market is very sharp and efficient, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. You're not gonna be beating it with strategies as simple as "pick against the bigger alumni base" or "bet against the SEC all the time because the media says they're way weaker than the betting market says". Public money only really moves the line on a few big games a year. The rest of the time, the bookmakers are just trying to pick as accurate a line as possible to keep the sharps from picking them off while they collect the vig from the recreational bettors. You just can't afford to intentionally shade lines like in the pre-internet era, it's too easy for people to sit at their laptops and line-shop every book around the world. They're just not gonna be off by huge margins. And given that America's opinion of the SEC is so much lower than their own, if anything they'll try to err on the opposite side rating the SEC lower than what they truly believe.

 

[DawgCatcher]

You know where the SEC dominates? They dominate the bottom of the list in average SAT scores for incoming freshman football players. They dominate the list of highest percent of illiterate players. They dominate the list of former players with worthless degrees. They dominate the list of former players on welfare or working in fast food.

The SEC also dominates the list of former players working at ESPN and radio shows making megabucks - David Pollack, Buck Belue, Kevin Butler, Tim Tebow...

Trivia Question: What are "Buck" Belue's real first and middle names???

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

Next time you call in to 680 the Fan, be sure to call him Benjie! LOL!

 

[mmbt0ne]

1. You fundamentally misunderstand the nature of betting markets.

I'll let iggy speak for iggy as far as his experience with the betting market goes, but I can tell you from experience that this is up there with the most demonstrably false statements ever written on this board.

 

[steebu]

Tech had clear chances to put FSU away? I didn't see that.

I believe we had one chance to put FSU away, or at least put them in a deep hole that they might not have survived. We got the ball with 5 minutes left in the 2nd quarter. If we had punched that in, we would've been up 28-21 going into the half. We got the ball to start, and we marched it all the way down on a 7 minute drive for a score. If we had gotten that end-of-the-first-half TD and the opening 2nd half TD, we'd have been up 35-21 with 8 minutes left in the 3rd. That might've swung the momentum so far in our favor that anything could've happened (Winston forces a ball for a pick, or runs off to Publix for some crab legs, etc.). At the very least it puts our D in a better position to survive a 14 point swing.

Missed blocks and poor execution on our last drive of the first half killed us. Justin said in the post-game presser that FSU wasn't doing anything differently, we just weren't executing as well, and he was right. It was a night where we needed near-perfect execution all around, and that's hard to do.

Again, sometimes you just have to give credit to the other guys. They're a really, really talented team.

 

[DawgCatcher]

Tech had clear chances to put FSU away? I didn't see that.

I wouldn't say we ever had a "clear chance" to put the game away, but the passing game might have given us a chance had we utilized it more when it was clear they were getting stops on us. We can all agree that our passing game has bailed us out at times when we've been in some binds in some of our other games besides UGA. I just believe when the game's on the line, sometimes you just have to go for broke. Sometimes, you can only bring what you brought to the fight, but if you've got other weapons, by all means use them. UGA was short-passing us on their last drive before the end of regulation 5-10 yards on many plays and got a go-ahead score in no time. We employed that passing offense and got us a quick score, too, when it was too late to make difference on the scoreboard. I just believe we need an answer for when teams figure out how to stop our TO in the 2nd half when the game's on the line.

 

[DawgCatcher]

I would argue the perimeter blocking is what primarily killed us in those three series. The plays were there to be made, we just didn't make them. In the UGA game, abandoning our passing was the only thing that allowed us to win. In a perfect world, we have both. However, I don't think we needed passing in either of those games to win. Go back and look at some of our biggest victories under Paul Johnson. I think you will be surprised to see that those games are, by and large, also the games where we generally have the lowest passing attempts.

That said, we missed Smelter. I am convinced that 4th and 5 would have looked different with him.

Yeah, it seems to me that FSU had started plugging the gaps forcing us to the perimeter where they could buy more reaction time and make us run more lateral yardage. They decided to hedge their bets on the speed of their defense by forcing us to run the perimeter or pass. It was very smart defensive coaching on their part. With missed blocks on the perimeter, maybe we should've done some "student body" plays. LOL! We could sure use a big tight end in those circumstances to haul in a 5-and-out and just nickel-and-dime them to paydirt! When you can dump the short pass right behind them on the perimeter, it drives them crazy.

 

[Ggee87]

I wouldn't say we ever had a "clear chance" to put the game away, but the passing game might have given us a chance had we utilized it more when it was clear they were getting stops on us. We can all agree that our passing game has bailed us out at times when we've been in some binds in some of our other games besides UGA. I just believe when the game's on the line, sometimes you just have to go for broke. Sometimes, you can only bring what you brought to the fight, but if you've got other weapons, by all means use them. UGA was short-passing us on their last drive before the end of regulation 5-10 yards on many plays and got a go-ahead score in no time. We employed that passing offense and got us a quick score, too, when it was too late to make difference on the scoreboard. I just believe we need an answer for when teams figure out how to stop our TO in the 2nd half when the game's on the line.

I believe the run game from FSU was running the clock almost as well as ours was. With our D getting manhandled, im sure CPJ was trying to limit their time on the field. Passing could have backfired tremendously and made the margin for error even smaller. I understand what you are saying... but without Smelter/Zenon our pass game was gonna suffer big time. Our offense almost relies on 1 big time receiving threat to move the chains. Without those 2 players... i just dont see the advantages of putting the ball in the air. Especially when the run game was so successful.

 

[Rock]

They don't "dominate". That's really the point.

Yes, some years, perhaps even most years recently, they have been the better conference. But the margin is NOT and has NEVER been "dominating" the way SECSPN and their bevy of former SEC players like Pollock have made it sound. Myths about "SEC speed" abound, when the facts don't support the strength of the myth (every league has fast guys, and at the combine it is often a non SEC guy who is fastest).

You can choose to believe Sagarin if you like. Having watched a lot of football this year, I would say that UNC should beat at least half the SEC teams on any given night. Could lose to them (UNC is as inconsistent as it gets) but should beat 'em.

Putting it another way, the Nolan Power Index has the middle team of the ACC ranked in exactly the middle of SEC teams. It has the SEC as the strongest conference, and pending bowl game results that make sense, BUT it is the use of words like "dominating" that irk me (and many other fans). If you're a 3 point favorite at a neutral site, is that "dominate"? I don't think so.

Calm down dude. and please take your SEC love elsewhere. You're talking about a league that sells its soul for football, lies, cheats, steals, and makes a mockery of academics just short of the standard set by UNC. I'll let you go that route if the result is you're only slightly better (and that is, in any dispassionate view of the data, the accurate term for where they stand in relation to the rest of the college football world).

When they refer to SEC speed, they mean as a team..
When you have 3rd string RB's that could start anywhere else in the country, that's SEC speed.
When you have DE/LB's running 4.5's, that's SEC speed.

Not bashing the ACC here but you beat teams in the SEC east which is the weakest it has ever been.. Did you see the SecCG? Mizzou was a joke.

There is a reason the SEC has won so much lately, and they beat up on each other every week. Someone has to lose.

FSU would be a 6-6 team the in SEC West. They can't get that lucky against legit teams.

And if winning NC's what 6 or 7 years in a row and going to the dance the last 8 or 9 isn't dominating, I don't know what is.

 

[Rock]

You know where the SEC dominates? They dominate the bottom of the list in average SAT scores for incoming freshman football players. They dominate the list of highest percent of illiterate players. They dominate the list of former players with worthless degrees. They dominate the list of former players on welfare or working in fast food.

well congrats...

when is the last time you saw a sold out stadium for the science fair?

this is a football board, not chemistry.

 

[flounder]

Not bashing the ACC here but you beat teams in the SEC east which is the weakest it has ever been.. Did you see the SecCG? Mizzou was a joke.

So the SEC east doesn't count as SEC anymore? Any conference would look good if you could put the best teams in one division and disclaim the other division.

 

[iggymcfly]

SEC East was much better than given credit for. They were the 3rd best division in football this year according to Sagarin. They just had a hard time maintaining decent records since they played twice as many Top 30 teams OOC as any other division, and also had far and away the toughest cross-division scheduling.

 

[DTGT]

I believe we had one chance to put FSU away, or at least put them in a deep hole that they might not have survived. We got the ball with 5 minutes left in the 2nd quarter. If we had punched that in, we would've been up 28-21 going into the half.

Ok... So what you are saying is that if a team scored a TD on every single possession they would most likely win the game...

 

[gtcrew]

It's funny how the betting market (group of experts looking at things as objectively as possible with millions of dollars on the line) and Sagarin (objective computer ranking deriving numbers solely from the scores of the games) both rate the SEC much, much higher than ESPN who's supposedly biased in favor of them.

Here are the ratings of the top 12 SEC teams according to the betting market:
http://stats.inpredictable.com/rankings/ncaaf.php

2. Alabama
5. Auburn
6. Georgia
7. Mississippi State
14. Ole Miss
16. LSU
19. Arkansas
22. Florida
28. Missouri
30. Texas A&M
33. South Carolina
34. Tennessee

And here they are by Sagarin, the top computer ranking:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/ncaaf/sagarin/

1. Alabama
4. Ole Miss
6. Mississippi State
8. Georgia
9. Auburn
11. LSU
13. Arkansas
16. Missouri
20. Texas A&M
21. Florida
29. Tennessee
37. South Carolina

Tells a pretty similar tale, doesn't it? Both clearly show that the SEC has gotten BETTER, not worse to the point that they're more dominant than ever and even their 12th best team would be above average in the ACC or Big Ten.

I keep hearing the 4-0 thing brought up a lot, and while that was a great moment in time for our conference, it doesn't really tell the tale. First off, we actually went 4-1 vs. the SEC this year, not 4-0 as Clemson's loss to Georgia was every bit as legitimate as the other games. Secondly, all 5 of the inter-conference games involved the ACC's Top 4 teams by Sagarin (1. FSU, 2. GT, 3. Clemson x2, 4. Louisville) while on average we faced a below average slate from the SEC (4. Georgia x2, 10. Florida, 12. South Carolina, 13. Kentucky). Can you imagine if the shoe was on the other foot and the 5 games were (1. Alabama, 2. Ole Miss, 3. Mississippi State x2, 4. Georgia) facing off against (4. Louisville x2, 10. Pittsburgh, 12. North Carolina, 13. Syracuse)? If we went 1-4 in those matchups, we'd consider ourselves lucky.

Now, I do think the ACC's getting better as a conference. We've made incremental progress each of the past 4 years, and if we keep getting better, we should win more recruiting battles to the point that maybe 5 or 6 years down the line we'll be able to compete with the SEC on even terms. When we just keep mindlessly downgrading them as they dominate though, using cute little catch-phrases like SECSPN, it just makes us look like delusional homers incapable of looking at things rationally.

Iggy, you can't use sagarin to make the argument you are making. The reason those teams got demoted to middle of the SEC pack is partly because they lost. Can you rerun with the betting numbers? Those aren't perfect, since hype can move a line illogically. And the sec has hype. But they aren't bad.

 

[gtcrew]

SEC East was much better than given credit for. They were the 3rd best division in football this year according to Sagarin. They just had a hard time maintaining decent records since they played twice as many Top 30 teams OOC as any other division, and also had far and away the toughest cross-division scheduling.

Oh God, again with the Sagarin. The SEC east champ lost to Indiana. Please.

 

[flounder]

SEC East was much better than given credit for. They were the 3rd best division in football this year according to Sagarin. They just had a hard time maintaining decent records since they played twice as many Top 30 teams OOC as any other division, and also had far and away the toughest cross-division scheduling.

Is the ACC Atlantic the 2nd best division then? Because they smoked the SEC East.