re: Who thinks 14 is the new magic number for all conferences??

quote:

---

you think Bama/Auburn would go away?

---

No, but the third saturday in october (AL/TN) would...

I don't why this whole 4 superconferences with 16 each even came from. It's like one person said it and now that's the only option.

16 just sounds like waay too many. We can't stay at 13 so we have to go to 14. But 16 is just too many.

right, and I am guessing Bama/Tenn isn't going away either...

quote:

---

yeah, thats why we dont already have some form of playoff in place right

---

If you don't understand why there's not a playoff in place as is.. there's no helping you

quote:

---

I love how some SEC fans just poo poo the single most storied and historically important conference rivalry in SEC history as if no one is going to even notice when the game goes away. Auburn doesn't care because they get to keep both of their 2 most important rivalries with the icing on top being that they forced Alabama to give up one of those. Of course Auburn offered to move East.

As for 14 team conferences, I'm glad many people are finally realizing what a disaster 16 team conferences will be. Any thing that changes the divisional format to more than 2 divisions or forces current members to change divisions will be a HUGE mistake in the long run. Add A&M to the West and pick another solid respectable addition for the East and BE DONE WITH IT!!! Everyone loses a non conference game but the schedules CAN be worked to where teams don't lose a home game. You just have to be a little more creative that's all.

---

If we go to 14 and AU moves, you can kiss that game goodbye. However, if we subsequently go to 16, things could be arranged where you could get it back. IMO, 14 is worse than 16. I would prefer to continue to it as long as there are more than 12 teams.

As far as the most storied and historically important rivalry, I always wondered why I really don't give a shite about that game, so I did a little digging. Looking at the last 45 yrs, I came up with the following facts wrt TN and AL AP ranking at the time the game was played:

o One or the other was ranked in 41 years

o Both were ranked concurrently only 16 years.

o Both were ranked in the top 10 7 times, 3 in the period from 67-73, before integration in the SEC. So we've had 4 top ten matchups in the last 37 yrs.

o Based on rankings, there were 11 upsets of which 4 look significant.

Look, I know we run the shite out of Billy Cannon's tape, but anything pre-superbowl, really the mid to late 70's, is irrelevant to today's game. I can understand the importance of GA/AL to AU at least for recruiting purposes. I can understand why AL is important to TN, and I can understand why TN would be important to AL in terms of tradition, but this game is really only important to you guys as this is not really that complelling of a game.