On Wednesday at SEC Media Days, Nick Saban repeated something he has said for years. He said that 12-game SEC regular-season schedules should be made up of Power conference teams playing only Power conference opponents.
His bold statement is one he has been making for a decade. Despite the widespread respect Saban earned from his fellow coaches, few other head coaches agreed with him.
Wednesday's iteration of the bold Saban claim was: "I actually think we should play 12 games against Power 5, that's it. Because it's a business. People want to see those games. TV wants to have that kind of inventory to show those games."
For Alabama football fans, Nick Saban is almost never wrong. Saban is 100% correct about fan interest in games with more evenly matched opponents. But he did make a small error by describing the Power conferences as a 'Power 5.' College football no longer has a Power Five. Most groupings of teams now refer to a Power Four. That too is not college football's reality. College football has three tiers. They are the Power Two (SEC and Big Ten), the lesser two (ACC and Big 12), and all the other FBS conferences and independents. The one exception is Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish are unique; not an appendage of the Power Two, but too powerful to be excluded from college football's upper tier.
Nick Saban Plan and Risk
Should Power Two teams only play Power Two teams? In the business correlation used by Saban, the answer is yes. Fans would love it. Would it be in the best interest of SEC teams? That answer is probably a no. Top SEC teams already have a disadvantage compared to top Big Ten teams. The bottom half of the B1G has weaker teams than the bottom half of the SEC.
The big problem with tougher SEC regular-season schedules is the Playoff. This week, Greg Sankey made it clear that the SEC has no confidence in the Playoff's Selection Committee properly using strength of schedule and strength of record in its rankings. Even if all Power Fours played only Power Four teams, the top teams in the B1G, ACC, and the Big 12 would have a playoff selection advantage over the SEC.
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