Senior Bowl 2012: Why South Will Easily Dominate North

The 2012 Senior Bowl is filled with superb talent, but it's the South team that has the edge over the North, which is why it will have no trouble winning this Saturday. 

Coached by Mike Shanahan, the South team features plenty of first-round NFL talent. The North team, on the other hand, is coached by Leslie Frazier, and its top prospects are mainly mid-to-late round players. 

In the past five years, the South team has won three teams, largely in part to the SEC's dominance in college football. 

This year, the level of talent is vastly superior on the South team, which will lead to an impressive victory over the North team. 

Defense 

As the saying goes, defense wins championships. The same can be said for the Senior Bowl, meaning the South is going to crush the North. 

It was very evident this past college football season that a strong defense would take you far. The majority of the top defensive teams came from the South, so naturally their team is going to be stacked.

When looking at the South's roster, it has five defenders who have been given high praise and will likely end up as a first-round draft pick. 

Those guys are Courtney Upshaw from Alabama, Quinton Coples and Zach Brown from North Carolina, Melvin Ingram from South Carolina and Janoris Jenkins from North Alabama.

The North team has only one player with a first-round grade, which is cornerback Alfonzo Dennard. 

Since the defense is littered with future NFL stars, the South will force the North offense to have very little success. 

Offense 

One would think that since the South is so overwhelming better on defense, the North's offense would be stellar. 

Unfortunately, that isn't the case at all. While the North has better running backs in Chris Polk, Doug Martin and Isaiah Pead, the North has better wide receivers, quarterbacks and a higher rated offensive line. 

Nick Foles, Brandon Weeden and Ryan Lindley of the South team will fare better than Kirk Cousins, Kellen Moore and Russell Wilson of the North team. 

The reason for that is because the South has some skilled playmaking wideouts whose game translates to the NFL very well. Dwight Jones, Jeff Fuller, Juron Criner, Joe Adams and Marquis Maze together are a better group than what the North team has. 

To give you an idea of how thin the North is at star wide receivers, its top guys are DeVier Posey and Marvin McNutt. 

The North's top overall player is likely offensive tackle Mike Adams of Ohio State. The South has its own star offensive linemen in Cordy Glenn of Georgia and Zerbie Sanders, who are both receiving first-round grades. 

The South's roster is much better than the North from top to bottom, and that is why it will win easily on Saturday.