Less than half of SEC football teams will be undefeated at end of September

Again in the 2022 season, more SEC football teams will populate the Top 10 than any other conference. As many as eight SEC football teams have a reasonable chance to finish the season in the Top 25.

Numerous preseason, Top 25 predictions have been published. This week, Athlon published a Top 25 for how the 2022 season will end, following the bowl games and Playoff games. Six SEC teams are in the Athlon prediction and three of them are in the top five; Alabama at No. 1; Georgia at No. 3 and Texas A&M at No. 5.

Some of us don’t see the Aggies finishing that high, but this post is not for debating Athlon’s predictions.

Instead, this discussion uses a shorter period for predictions. That period is the first month of the college football season and the prediction is which SEC teams will still be undefeated on Sept. 30.

Details on each team follow, but the bottom line is that less than half of the conference’s teams will be undefeated.

The teams are listed below with their most probable first loss and first-month overall record. Taking the easiest prediction first, we begin with the Vanderbilt Commodores.

Vanderbilt Commodores

• The Dores’ first loss will likely be in game three against the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. Vanderbilt should open with a win over Hawaii, beat Elon, and though they may not be favored, the Dores will also beat Northern Illinois before losing to Wake Forest and the Crimson Tide. The predicted Sept. 30 record is 3-2.