So we all know about how pretty much every team in this league with the exception of Vandy and MSST hang their hat on at least one era of glory and that gives rise to all this tradition of greatness all the old guard SEC teams purportedly have.
But if you look back at the schedules from the 40s through basically the mid-70s, some teams were playing 5 league games and others were playing 4. And they weren't loading up their non-conference slates with the likes of Notre Dame, OU, Texas, Nebraska, etc. Not too hard to fluff that win column when you're playing more than half your schedule against the likes of Chattanooga, University of the South, Memphis, etc.
In addition, some league opponents would go upwards of 20-years without playing each other. Ole Miss and Bama did not play a league game from 1944 through 1965. Georgia/LSU have only played 32 times TOTAL and didn't play at all from 1953 until 1978. Florida/TN didn't play from 1955 until 1969. Even Bama/Auburn didn't play between 1907 and 1948. A lot of these teams' best seasons were, in part, the result of dodging the other good teams in the league. For example, UGA didn't play 10-win Bama during the 1980 national title run (they didn't play Bama at all from 1977 until 1984).
This made me curious, how much different would our history be if we were able to have occasionally dodged Nebraska/OU? Or what about Arkansas if they didn't have to annually contend with Texas in the SWC?
Does anyone know why the old SEC schedules were so weird?
But if you look back at the schedules from the 40s through basically the mid-70s, some teams were playing 5 league games and others were playing 4. And they weren't loading up their non-conference slates with the likes of Notre Dame, OU, Texas, Nebraska, etc. Not too hard to fluff that win column when you're playing more than half your schedule against the likes of Chattanooga, University of the South, Memphis, etc.
In addition, some league opponents would go upwards of 20-years without playing each other. Ole Miss and Bama did not play a league game from 1944 through 1965. Georgia/LSU have only played 32 times TOTAL and didn't play at all from 1953 until 1978. Florida/TN didn't play from 1955 until 1969. Even Bama/Auburn didn't play between 1907 and 1948. A lot of these teams' best seasons were, in part, the result of dodging the other good teams in the league. For example, UGA didn't play 10-win Bama during the 1980 national title run (they didn't play Bama at all from 1977 until 1984).
This made me curious, how much different would our history be if we were able to have occasionally dodged Nebraska/OU? Or what about Arkansas if they didn't have to annually contend with Texas in the SWC?
Does anyone know why the old SEC schedules were so weird?
