SEC Football: Does Alabama's Loss Help or Hurt The Conference?

 Alabama shockingly lost to South Carolina this weekend in convincing fashion, 35-21.

Not only did the Gamecocks' victory seriously dampen the Crimson Tide’s BCS Title hopes, but it hurt the SEC as a whole.

An SEC team has won each of the last four BCS National Championships, with the SEC Championship game serving as the de facto National Championship game.

No one can argue the SEC’s spot as the number one conference in college football, but Alabama’s loss puts a huge chink in their previously impenetrable armor.

In years past, in the cases of Florida and Alabama, there have been two bona fide undefeated championship contenders in the SEC, but that’s about to change.

A result of the league’s superior depth, there won’t be any undefeated teams in the conference this season, with LSU almost certainly dropping a game to Auburn, Alabama, and/or Arkansas, and Auburn likely losing to Arkansas or Alabama.

While it may not mean that SEC football has diminished at all, it will seem so in the eyes of the public.

A pair of undefeated teams from the Big Ten, Pac-10, or Big 12 will take precedent over this year’s one or two-loss SEC champion, making the SEC look like it has finally been surpassed.

Other conferences will now be able to make the argument that they have an “invincible” team, something that the SEC won’t be able to claim for the first time in over four years.

A SEC-advocate can argue about “SEC speed” all they want, but if the National Champion comes from another conference, which I absolutely think it will, then their claim to be number one is tarnished.

Alabama’s loss doesn’t signal the demise of SEC football by any stretch, but it means that we likely won’t see an SEC national champion, leaving the door open for other conferences to argue their way to the top.

Just because SEC football is still the best doesn’t mean people will see it that way.

So Alabama, not only did you hurt yourselves, but you hurt the sanctity of SEC football’s perennial dominance.

You should be ashamed.

Matt Rudnitsky is a student at the University of Michigan and a writing intern at Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Mattrud