SEC Football Q&A: What Constitutes a Successful Bowl Season for the SEC?
Bowl season is underway around the country, and it's safe to say this is the most critical postseason the SEC has faced in quite some time.
The conference once known for its domination of the national landscape has gone winless in major bowls (BCS/New Year's Six) over the last two years, and last season's 7-5 bowl record left a lot to be desired.
According to Odds Shark, only one SEC team—Florida, getting four points versus Michigan in the Buffalo Wild Wings Citrus Bowl—is an underdog during bowl season.
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
What must the SEC do this December and January to get back on the right track? That question and more are addressed in this week's edition of SEC Q&A.
While nine of the 10 SEC teams are favored to win, a 9-1 record is a pipe dream. This is bowl season, which always lends itself to shenanigans, weird football and upsets that come seemingly out of nowhere.
A 7-3 record would constitute a good bowl season, but that is with the stipulation that one of those seven wins come from No. 2 Alabama in the Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic national semifinal against No. 3 Michigan State. Big games matter, and the Crimson Tide are the SEC's hope to recapture the magic of what used to be a conference that thrived in the spotlight rather than withered.
Anything worse than 7-3 (ignore the possibility of Alabama playing in the College Football Playoff National Championship) should be considered a letdown, with the degree varying based on which teams lose, how they lose and what it means to the future of the conference.
If LSU comes out firing through the air but loses to Texas Tech, that's still something positive. If Auburn falls to Memphis but the defense looks halfway decent and the Tigers get good quarterback play, that's a positive.
On the flip side, if Florida falls to Michigan without any semblance of an offense, LSU's Brandon Harris struggles to exploit the nation's 115th-ranked pass defense or Northwestern lights up Tennessee's defense, those are all concerning.
A 7-3 record is good, but 6-4 drops the SEC into that unpleasant middle ground where perception of how games actually go down comes into play.
"@BarrettSallee Is Michigan State's front-7 the best that Alabama will face all year?
— CFB Real Talk (@CFBrealtalk) December 21, 2015"
No, but it's close.
With a month to get into "talkin' season" prior to the national semifinal, that has led to some rather interesting quotes out of the Michigan State camp.
"We are going to have to hit him harder—harder than we've ever hit anyone else," linebacker Jon Reschke said, according to 247Sports' Mike Wilson. "It's a challenge we are accepting."
Good for Michigan State for not talking itself down. You need that kind of confidence if you're going to stop a 242-pound monster like Henry.
While the Spartans have been solid this season holding opponents to just 113.08 yards per game on the ground (seventh-best in the nation), Henry isn't going to be surprised by anything they bring to the table.
He went up against a Florida defense that gave up just 120.62 yards per game in the SEC Championship Game on the tail end of a stretch in which the Crimson Tide played five straight games. That game, which I covered, was by far the hardest Henry has been hit all year.
He was slowed quite a bit early as the fast and physical Gators defense stood him up and landed body blow after body blow. Sure, he finished the game with 189 yards and a touchdown. But he didn't really get going until late in the third quarter when he ripped off 35 yards on four straight plays. He averaged just 4.3 yards per carry that afternoon, his third-lowest average of the season.
"I think it's the best defense that we faced," he said in the postgame press conference. "They're very physical, very disruptive, very fast on the defensive line. Athletic linebackers who are very physical and try to knock you out and good secondary. So I think it's the best defense that we've faced all year."
Facing that defense at the end of a five-game stretch is a much tougher task than facing Michigan State with a month to prepare.
With full recognition of what's going on at Texas A&M right now, it still has to be LSU head coach Les Miles.
He was nearly fired following the 2015 season due to his inability to produce a balanced attack, despite having every defense focusing almost solely on stopping star running back Leonard Fournette. He nearly got his pink slip in late November and still doesn't seem too concerned with the direction of his offense.
Offensive coordinator Cam Cameron, who's the highest-paid offensive coordinator in the country according to USA Today, appears to be sticking around.
"I am contemplating no changes at this point, in personnel," Miles said earlier this month, according to Marcus Rodrigue of the Advocate. "This would be a time where you would look at change. Not necessarily a widespread, complete [change], but tweak things to make yourself more productive."
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. It seems, though, that Miles is dead set on going into the 2016 season with dual-threat quarterback Brandon Harris running a pro-style system that has proved to be ineffective.
While the noise in the system has calmed a bit after athletics director Joe Alleva botched the plan to oust Miles, that doesn't mean it will stay that way. The Tigers open with Wisconsin, Mississippi State and Auburn all before the start of October. If the offense struggles out of the gate, Miles might not be LSU's head coach when the leaves change color.
Before the season, absolutely not.
Tennessee has closed strong in 2015 and has an abundance of talent coming back to Rocky Top in 2016 to help head coach Butch Jones make a run at the program's first SEC Championship Game since 2007. But he hasn't proved to be a big-game coach yet, and that will prevent voters in the Associated Press and USA Today coaches polls from giving the Volunteers the benefit of the doubt this offseason.
However, that might not last long.
Tennessee will likely be in the preseason Top 25, and considering the uncertainty in the rest of the SEC East, it will probably be the media's pick to win the division at SEC media days in July. If Tennessee can get by Virginia Tech in the Battle at Bristol in Week 2 and then break its 11-game losing streak to Florida—which visits Tennessee—in Week 4, it will be hard to keep the Vols out of the Top 10.
The 2016 season will be a critical one for Jones. With a veteran quarterback, experienced offensive line and backfield, solid defense and Florida coming to Neyland Stadium, the only excuse for not winning the division would be some sort of major injury or roster attrition.
Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Statistics are courtesy of cfbstats.com, and recruiting information is courtesy of 247Sports.
Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and national college football video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a host on Bleacher Report Radio on SiriusXM 83. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.
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