SEC Football: Why the SEC Should Not Expand but Could Still Add Texas A&M

After the shakeups in the Big Ten, Big 12 and Pac-10 coming into the 2011 season, Texas A&M has expressed their desire to join the SEC. This has spurred talk of expanding the SEC to 14 or even 16 teams. However, expanding the SEC is a bad idea that would ultimately change the landscape of college football for the worse.

With all the talk lately of conference realignment and the possibility of the so-called super conferences, the NCAA needs to take a step back and figure out the least disruptive way to bring some order to college football and stabilize the BCS automatic qualifying conferences.

There is not much debate that the SEC is the premier conference in the nation. Should the SEC decide to expand to a 16-team “super conference,” expect major shifts in all the other conferences as they follow suit and create other 16-team conferences by expanding or combining existing AQ conferences.

One of the worst effects of having fewer, bigger conferences is that there will be more teams competing for less championships. What this will ultimately do is put more influence into the hands of the pollsters and the BCS equation. With so many clamoring for a playoff to decide a champion on the field, this would be a step in the wrong direction.

The SEC needs to stick with 12 teams, but still could make room for Texas A&M with a little creative shifting. First, take Vanderbilt out of the SEC. The conference is not going to lose anything except for a team that has never, and probably will never, contend for a SEC Championship. After that, there are several scenarios that could work. Texas A&M could simply join the SEC East. Or, an SEC West team, probably Arkansas, could move to the East and A&M could go to the West.

Again, with all the talk of conference realignments and expansion, the NCAA should take this opportunity to mandate some consistency within the AQ conferences.  Namely, each conference should have two six-team divisions and a conference championship game.

This structure would actually make it fairly easy for the NCAA to institute a playoff system where each conference championship game would essentially serve as a first round.  Then seed the conference champions according to the BCS poll and add  two wild card teams with the highest BCS ranking that didn’t win an AQ conference, and there is your eight-team playoff.

Seems simple enough, right Rose Bowl Committee?

I know there are many monetary issues that I have not addressed that come into play with this issue, but simply in terms of what is best for the sport and the fans, I sincerely hope the SEC decides against expansion.