Fun fact: The SEC still hasn’t announced its football tiebreakers, and we’re almost 3 weeks away from the start of the season.

#4
#4
15 July

While taking questions at SEC Media Days in Dallas Monday, Commissioner Greg Sankey said there is a plan in place to address potential tiebreakers at the end of the regular season.

“It is a lengthy plan consolidated around, I think, eight principles,” Sankey said, adding that they provided the conference’s athletic directors with an update Thursday. “We go back to our athletics directors at their next videoconference that’s about two weeks away.”

Sankey said the plan can be finalized anytime between now and the beginning of the season.

16 July

There’s still a lot of tweaking to be done,” said Mark Womack, the SEC’s associate commissioner. “But our ADs have seen it. Our coaches have seen different versions of it as we’ve started to tweak and go through everything. So we just want to try to be sure that we’ve got all the different situations covered that could pop up so there are no surprises.”

“We’ve got a pretty good idea, but we don’t want to put it out there just yet,” Womack said. “Because some of the tweaks that go through might impact (where) we might want to flip two (tiebreakers).”
 
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#6
#6
VolsFan6 said:
Why wouldn't they just use the basketball tiebreakers?
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Because these things are built on consensus among those involved.

The basketball tiebreakers were ultimately agreed upon by all the ADs and Basketball coaches.

The football tiebreakers will be agreed upon by all the ADs and football coaches.

And so there could be differences.

Whatever, they'll get it sorted out here in the next few weeks.

Go Vols!
 
#8
#8
Just in from the SEC office in Birmingham...
First tiebreaker -Does it help Alabama? If yes, then proceed with Alabama.
Second tiebreaker - How does it affect Alabama? If good, proceed with helping Alabama.
Third tiebreaker - If Alabama is not involved, review schedule for the most equitable solution and choose the team based on overall record, playoff ranking and strength of schedule.
 
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#9
#9
We got robbed out of an SEC championship game appearance in 2003 when they decided with a couple of weeks left that the highest ranked team would be selected. There should never be a situation where teams begin a season without an unambiguous selection pathway already determined.
 
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#10
#10
JohnnyJava said:
We got robbed out of an SEC championship game appearance in 2003 when they decided with a couple of weeks left that the highest ranked team would be selected. There should never be a situation where teams begin a season without an unambiguous selection pathway already determined.
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We were a good, ugly football team that season. That UGA game sucked though.
 
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#13
#13
Brave Volunteer said:
Christ, they could've avoided a lot of this altogether if the SEC had just went to a 9 or 10 game conference schedule.
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I agree, but I don’t blame Sankey for not giving Disney/ABC more product for the same price . I think we (The SEC) want to see how the selection process for the CFP goes and also what happens to the ACC moving forward.
 
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#14
#14
RDU VOL#14 said:
I agree, but I don’t blame Sankey for not giving Disney/ABC more product for the same price . I think we (The SEC) want to see how the selection process for the CFP goes and also what happens to the ACC moving forward.
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As time goes on, I don't think conference championships are going to matter much anyway. I mean, what would you rather do? Get beaten up by Georgia or Alabama in a physical SEC championship game or host a #10 seed at home in the first round of the playoffs?
 
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#16
#16
Brave Volunteer said:
As time goes on, I don't think conference championships are going to matter much anyway. I mean, what would you rather do? Get beaten up by Georgia or Alabama in a physical SEC championship game or host a #10 seed at home in the first round of the playoffs?
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I get what you’re saying. I think it’s going to depend on how the selection committee treats the loser of the conference title games, the SEC and B1G in particular. If you have 2 1 loss teams in the game and both are top 5, is it right to penalize the 1 loss team for losing when the 10-2 team who didn’t play gets to rest up? The sweet spot is going to be the 5 seed, because they’re going to host the G5 team and then they get the 4 seed, which is either the ACC or Big 12 champ in the quarterfinals.
 
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#18
#18
JohnnyJava said:
We got robbed out of an SEC championship game appearance in 2003 when they decided with a couple of weeks left that the highest ranked team would be selected. There should never be a situation where teams begin a season without an unambiguous selection pathway already determined.
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Not sure that Tennessee really got “robbed” of an appearance that year. The rule in place prior would have involved the Athletic Directors of the remaining 8 schools (LSU wouldn’t be included as the West Division bid holder) voting on which of the 3 (between UGA, UT, and UF) received the Eastern Division bid in the championship game.

The final determinant being votes cast by South Carolina, Arkansas, Auburn, Alabama, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Ole Miss, and Mississippi State had a much greater chance of turning into some sort of a clusterf—k or robbing a team than what we got.

(Though to be fair, there’s a pretty high chance - when given a top 25 8-4 team, a top 10 10-2 teams, and a top 5 10-2 team - of those 8 deciding to pretty much vote along the rankings, anyway.)
 
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#21
#21
TrueOrange said:
Not sure that Tennessee really got “robbed” of an appearance that year. The rule in place prior would have involved the Athletic Directors of the remaining 8 schools (LSU wouldn’t be included as the West Division bid holder) voting on which of the 3 (between UGA, UT, and UF) received the Eastern Division bid in the championship game.

The final determinant being votes cast by South Carolina, Arkansas, Auburn, Alabama, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Ole Miss, and Mississippi State had a much greater chance of turning into some sort of a clusterf—k or robbing a team than what we got.

(Though to be fair, there’s a pretty high chance - when given a top 25 8-4 team, a top 10 10-2 teams, and a top 5 10-2 team - of those 8 deciding to pretty much vote along the rankings, anyway.)
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We didn't get robbed in 2003. UGA went and they had beat us by 4 touchdowns at home, and they were ranked higher. Not much of a legitimate gripe there.
 
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#22
#22
SIGH!! The wench misunderstood. I explained what a tiebreaker is. And that the SEC hadn't done anything abut it. She took my beautiful deco glass tie off the wall, dropped it on the table and broke it. Seeing my horror and dismay, she then tried to fix it.
1723305910477.jpeg
 
#23
#23
Brave Volunteer said:
As time goes on, I don't think conference championships are going to matter much anyway. I mean, what would you rather do? Get beaten up by Georgia or Alabama in a physical SEC championship game or host a #10 seed at home in the first round of the playoffs?
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Very true. Quite frankly, I wish they had just done away with conference championship games once the 12-team playoff was a reality. The fact that a team can be good enough to get to that game, and then lose it and certainly be penalized in some way just isn't fair. That team is going to end up playing 17 games if they are fortunate enough to get all the way to the championship game. Whatever happened to the concept of "player safety".

Like everything else, it's just thrown out there when and only when it's convenient. The SEC will never give up the cash cow that the conference title game has become.
 
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#25
#25
RDU VOL#14 said:
I get what you’re saying. I think it’s going to depend on how the selection committee treats the loser of the conference title games, the SEC and B1G in particular. If you have 2 1 loss teams in the game and both are top 5, is it right to penalize the 1 loss team for losing when the 10-2 team who didn’t play gets to rest up? The sweet spot is going to be the 5 seed, because they’re going to host the G5 team and then they get the 4 seed, which is either the ACC or Big 12 champ in the quarterfinals.
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I think it would be reasonable when it goes to 14 and you only have 2 teams with buys have it be set up so that the SEC champ game winner gets one of the buys and the other team still makes the field. As long as the championship games are playing for a bye in the playoffs they will still matter.

I do understand the risk that may happen to a team that went say 10-2 in the regular season is ranked 8-10 in playoff range and then losses the championship game to a 11-1 or 12-0 team ranked in the top 3. does that team deserve to get knocked out of the top 12 for a 9-3 team in their own conference who was ranked #13 and didn't play during champ week? Even falling behind another 10-2 team in their own conference who they had the tiebreaker with seems a little weird although i can understand that.
 
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