On behalf of SEC football fans, pushback is needed about the Big Ten owning college football. Granted the Michigan Wolverines and the Ohio State Buckeyes have won the most recent National Championships. Maybe a B1G team will win another Natty soon. Or maybe, the last two seasons were an evanescent dominance, as in something that quickly fades or disappears.
Even Paul Finebaum who capitulated to Big Ten dominance explained his conclusion with the words, "at the moment." Big Ten revelers would do well to remember something Alabama Football coach, Nick Saban told his teams during Alabama's dynastic run, "Success is not a continuum. Just because you were successful does not mean that you will continue to be successful."
SEC Football and National Championship History
The power of immediacy fuels recency bias. Looking back at National Championship history provides a refresher. From the start of the BCS era in 1998, current Big Ten teams have won six National Championships. USC shared one with LSU in 2003 and won another in 2004, which was later vacated. Ohio State has won three and Michigan one. In the same period, current SEC teams won 17 National Championships. Another telling stat is that while only three current Big Ten programs won a Natty in the BCS and College Football Playoff era, eight current SEC programs won a national title. Maybe currently the B1G is equally strong with the SEC at the top, but the strength has no depth among the rest of the Big Ten.
By all means, Ohio State and Michigan deserve a hat tip for their recent success. It can even be argued that back-to-back, not SEC National Champions is good for college football. But that should not be conflated into whimsical claims about parity between the two conferences. The 2024-25 SEC bowl season was glaringly bad. But those games have become exhibitions that often do not indicate how the same teams would perform in real, regular season games.
Ostensibly the Indiana Hoosiers were the B1G's second-best team, at least when measured by regular season games. Other than IU fans how many college football fans think the Hoosiers would have won more than eight games had they played one of the tougher 2024 SEC schedules?
Even those who might want to argue that IU would have won in Knoxville, College Station, Gainesville, Baton Rouge, or other intimidating SEC environments should admit such a claim is solely subjective. So maybe; until the Big Ten does more, let's tamp down the domination claims.