Keeping the SEC on Top: What's the Next Big Thing?

(Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)

This time last year, the Southeastern Conference was further distancing itself from all other collegiate sports leagues in the United States.

You might have heard about it. 

Nearly three billion dollars in television contracts.  CBS.  ESPN. 

Hard to miss, really.

Those tv deals—plus multiple national championships in football and basketball this decade—have earned the SEC top billing when it comes to college sports.

But now comes the tough part: staying there.

Don’t laugh.  It’s a lot easier to reach No. 1 than to stay at No. 1, or so the old saying goes.

Now that the SEC is perched atop the sporting world, all the other major conferences will be looking for ways to copy them, pass them and unseat them.

The ACC recently expanded to 12 teams.  Joe Paterno is pushing for expansion in the Big Ten, as well.  And the ACC is already angling for a new tv contract of their own, pointing out that each new tv deal usually sets the bar for future contracts.

So what should the SEC be doing to fend off competitors?

I talked to sports marketing expert Bill Schmidt about that very thing.  Schmidt was the Vice President of Worldwide Sports Marketing for Gatorade in the heady days of Michael Jordan and the Gatorade post-game shower.  You know, back before Gatorade rebranded itself as “G” and lost market share by the gallon.

Schmidt was also the VP of Sports at the 1984 Olympics and the CEO for Oakley.  In other words, this is a man who understands sports marketing from a billion dollar business perspective.

In his view, if Mike Slive and the SEC’s top decision-makers are smart (and they usually are), they already have a team of forward-thinking people locked in a room right now.

“I’m not talking about a ‘think tank,’” Schmidt said, “but something in that direction.”

The folks at Disney used to call their long-range planners “imagineers.”  Some groups refer to these people as futurists.  Whatever you want to call them, the SEC should be making use of them now.

In order to protect the dominant position they’ve already built.  In order to maintain their competitive (read: monetary) advantage.  And in order to be “first” as usual.

Which league was the first to expand to 12 teams?  The SEC.

Which league was the first to hold a multi-million dollar championship game?  The SEC.

Which league was the first to lock up a multi-billion dollar pair of tv contracts?  Again, it was the SEC.

“Now that the economy has turned downward, keeping that money coming in is more important than ever,” Schmidt said.  “Whether it’s tv revenue, schools’ contracts with their own sponsors, whatever, the key is bringing in more money than the next guy.”

The television contracts with CBS and ESPN couldn’t have come at a better time for the SEC.  The league locked in huge dollars for a 15-year period right as the economy began to slow. 

Competitor leagues like the ACC, in the current environment, most likely won’t be able to find television dance partners willing to match the SEC’s enormous pa

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