Colby Newton: It Just Means More, How the SEC Changed College Football | SEC Football

Colby Newton Author of SEC Football: How a Regional League Became a National Obsession joins 365 Sports to discuss his thoughts on how the SEC became the national power it is known as today, his thoughts on how TV programing helped the SEC going forward, his thoughts on the value of expansion for the SEC, the ability of the conference to innovate college football, and more.
Join Paul Catalina and Craig Smoak for the latest on college football and NFL talk!
Today's show is brought to you by Golf Partner:
golfpartner.sjv.io/Y9a70e
Support the stream: streamlabs.com/365sportsyt

[@jansonroberts2616]

The SEC has been the benchmark of success for over two decades. Very fortunate to have had great leadership in their commissioners.

[@TR-xp1eb]

The reason that it just means more is because the PERCENTAGE of people in those SEC states that care DEEPLY about college football is much greater than most other parts of the country.

[@stevemoserify]

because they don't have professional teams

[@TheJasonJackson84]

Yes the lack of professional sports being present, most Southern pro teams are the youngest in pro leagues. The SEC was able to capitalize from true national championship matchups, and it does help to a degree that the bowl system was structured in the Southern region. The major players in the Big 10 live in cold weather regions but don't embrace it. It's funny how Canadian football teams don't build domes, but American football runs from the cold weather. In the South its very rarely too hot to play a meaningful game of football. Many games have been played in the South in 95+ degree heat. And football itself is more loved than any other sport in the South. From little league to college, football is more embraced in the South than any other region.

[@andrewc7937]

Great interview

[@ammoniawilder4451]

Texas and Oklahoma was the biggest sec haters on earth until around 2021.

[@jansonroberts2616]

Mam maw always said that if you can’t beat em, join em.

[@ammoniawilder4451]

@@jansonroberts2616 that’s very true joshs’ mee maw did say that :/ damnit meemaw

[@TheJasonJackson84]

The SEC on CBS really didn't become the bigger aspect in the South until the early 2000s. There were so many SEC games on ESPN that had more cultural impact on the conference in the 1990s. ESPN with Ron Franklin was very impactful on SEC lore in the 1990s. CBS would air a lot of Big East games in the 90s probably just as many as the SEC. But only a couple handful of those SEC games on CBS changed the power within the conference or would be considered a classic game for whatever reason. The morning game on Jefferson Pilot sports broadcast carried more games that are remembered by SEC fans than CBS.

[@matthewhaselhorst1778]

I certainly respect the guy. As much as I absolutely loath the SEC, I respect how they got there, but damn that took some luck. Zero drama that entire time… meanwhile the big 12 couldn’t get enough drama. 😢. Certainly lucky things that helped: Big 10 got lucky that the CFP committee decided to favor a championship game over the big 12 without one in 2014. 1998/ first year of BCS bowls (BCS mishandling strongly favored Big 10 and SEC). Big 12 misses out on NY6 bowl win due to Kansas State barely losing double overtime, and getting left out of a BCS bowl completely as #3 in favor of Texas A&M who was over matched with Ohio state who got a free BCS bowl win. Also in 1998: Kstate missing the Natty gave Tennessee an arguably easier opponent, being Kstates offense was #1 in the nation. 1999 BCS bowls: Kstate #6 ironically after the Kstate rule is created, is left out of BCS Bowl games for lower ranked Michigan for whatever reason, giving the big 10 two BCS bowl wins. Also undefeated Marshall is completely left out. #7 Kstate is the highest ranked team not not even get a NY6 game, and unfairly plays an unranked Washington. In 2002, the big was arguably the strongest conference with 3 teams finishing in the top 10 and beating up on each other, giving other conferences the upper hand. There’s a ton of other examples but this is off the top of my head

[@TheJasonJackson84]

Mr K-State fan it's called conference champions get 1st bids. Just simply go to Wikipedia and read the Bowl Championship Series page. They established rules on how teams would be selected. The BCS only dealt with #1 vs #2. The bowls still had their conference affiliations in tact unless it was their year to host the BCS championship.

[@matthewhaselhorst1778]

@@TheJasonJackson84 They established rules and then changed those rules regularly, literally one called the Kstate rule being Kstate got screwed so badly in 98’. Champions got 1st bids to the conference tied bowl, and then the remaining participants were selected by BCS bowl committees which had to pick top 14 BCS ranked teams from any conference with 9 wins. That year Kstate was #3 and at-large Ohio state and Florida both lower ranked were chosen. This was controversial being it showed BCS committees cared more about views and brands. Human vote. The very next year in 99’, Kstate got screwed again by being a higher ranked at large team and Michigan lower ranked getting the at large bid due to being a bigger brand and payday for the committees. Human vote. Ironically that Kstate rule favored USC over Kstate themselves in the 2002-2003 season when USC was chosen for the Orange bowl at large bid over KSU who had won the head to head (not a screw job just ironic) 2011-12 season: controversially two SEC teams got into the title game (which ironically was due to human polling being used over computer polling keeping Oklahoma’s state out) and left two at large bids for the sugar bowl. Again Kstate, the higher ranked BCS at large team #8, is left out AGAIN to Michigan ranked lower and now Virginia tech also ranked lower. Human vote.

[@TheJasonJackson84]

@@matthewhaselhorst1778 yeah this is how major college football works. Small brands don't get the benefit of the doubt if they allow it to be left in the hands of the voters. 1998- Kansas St has nothing to cry about. K-st lost the 27-12 lead in the 4th quarter. Take care of your business become conference champs, they would have played for the national title. That's on K-St. The BCS never promised bowl selections based on rankings, plus K-St did itself no favors with it's out of conference scheduling back then. 1999- Kansas St probably would have gotten a shot in a BCS game if I made the call but they still hadn't broke through with a conference championship, so yeah it's tough but that was college football and college football didn't see any controversy over K-State that. May have been articles written about it in Kansas or it may have been talked about on local stations in Kansas, but the rest of the college football world didn't see any controversy there. 2002- I don't know really why you mentioned it because you stated they weren't done in that year. USC won it's conference K-State did not. K-State played against 2, count 'em two, I-AA opponents. What would the world say if a Big 10 or SEC team that wins 11 games did that and cried foul for not being amongst the biggest bowl games... ENTITLED. 2011- The 2 best teams in the country that year met and played for the national championship. Point blank, period. Alabama got fortunate, not because of any bias. Ok-St lost late in the season to a 5-4 Iowa St. Compare the resumè. Alabama loses by 3 points in OT against the #1 team in the country. But idiots think a less impressive team should play for that national title, no sir. The BCS did Ok-St a huge solid by only dropping them from #2 to #4 after that pathetic loss. Could K-State have been in a BCS bowl that year, fine makes no difference one way or the other really. But at some point K-State has to break thru so they can't be denied instead of crying foul because a bigger program with more prestige and larger fan base is selected over them. K-State is a good program. They are in a great position now with the traditional powers totally out of the Big 12. Either win the conference or put together an impressive 1-loss season or ride with what K-State has been for the past 30 years, an above average to really good program that never does what's necessary to be perceived as great. Great programs get the benefit of the doubt in college football.

[@ACiowa]

Too bad since they were good for a stretch of time, they have now consolidated power and money down to two conferences. So it is true it just means more now. Imagine if the patriots had got to change the NFL salary cap because they were better for 20 years than most of the NFL

[@Angrygumballl]

No fooling me because I remember when the SEC was nothung but Backwater campaigns by CBS. Now ESPN becomes their new pimp and they're the hottest things inside spread since sliced bread. 😂😂😂

[@JuneBaby01]

The SEC & CBS were so synonymous as a team that even the SEC on CBS's theme song was famous, so much so that the B1G10 sucks up to use it as their theme song now.

[@TheJasonJackson84]

​@@JuneBaby01CBS didn't create an exclusive theme for SEC football, it's the same college football theme CBS has used since at least the early 80s if not the late 70s.

[@marcuswilliams5385]

I'd say they have what we call the black belt. And lower caliber academic standards so they're able to get their main resource "black players" I remember when a righteous man by the name of Paul "bear" Bryant put black players on the field. Showing that they have an untapped pipeline in the south. Black players either went to hbcu's or came up north or out west.

[@robertmugabe2905]

lol , cut it out with the '' academic standards '' , bro . The only place that applies is the Ivy League. EVERYWHERE else , it's about money , power , and respect . The football landscape of today is proof of that .

[@TheJasonJackson84]

So if we're about lower academic standards how were black players ending up at programs out west or up north in the 1st place???? There are blacks that live in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, California. Why don't they play football as well as guys from the South? For the USCs and Michigans to reach past the guys in their backyard to get players from the South tells me a lot. Black southerners definitely don't dribble basketballs and jump higher than most blacks from the northeast but we're talking football. So just like Michigan is currently about an 80 to 85% black roster so is Alabama. The academic standards must be the same dumbass.