Last Year: 8-5 (4-4 in SEC), beat Virginia, 43-24, in Chick-Fil-A Bowl.

Why: The defense is stacked with experience and talent, and has the potential to be one of the best in the SEC, even though last year’s numbers show the Tigers to be a rather middling unit. But this was a young group last year and most of them are back, including senior OLB Daren Bates, who led the Tigers with 104 tackles, and junior Corey Lemonier, who led the Tigers with 9.5 sacks last year. The offense is underrated, with two returning starters at wide receiver, including Emory Blake, who had 36 receptions last year. TE Philip Lutzenkirchen should emerge as a larger threat in the passing offense this year, thanks to his size and improved health. With PK Cody Parkey and P Steve Clark, the Tigers have one of the most reliable kicking games in the SEC.

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Les Miles leaves the “Honey Badger,” Tyrann Mathieu, in Baton Rouge during SEC Media Days. You know Les. He’s always doing something unorthodox. You know, like leaving his best player and Heisman candidate at home for reasons that defy understanding. Les said he brought players that showed “leadership ability” to media days. HB isn’t a leader?  I mean, the worst thing this guy does from what I can see is that he tweets a lot. Instead Les leaves him in Baton Rouge and that’s all anyone writes about. That’s called a distraction, Les.

Alabama’s Nick Saban proposes that Penn State tax ticket buyers and donate proceeds to victims of child abuse. I like Saban’s thinking, but not the execution. That’s unfair to ticket buyers. I’d rather see Penn State donate 5 percent of its athletic operating revenue for the next five fiscal years for the same purpose.

More on Penn State, Grambling, Jim Delany’s power grab and the House that RGIII Built after the jump.

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Yes, the SEC has won the past six national championships, including last month’s all-SEC title game between Alabama and LSU. If you’re keeping score, Alabama has two titles, Florida has two titles, LSU has one and Auburn has one. And don’t forget – before this run began, LSU won the title in 2003 and Tennessee won the first BCS title in 1998.

The SEC doesn’t just win titles in January. They win recruiting titles too. Sure, sometimes texas will edge out the SEC for the No. 1 recruiting class, depending upon whose rankings you subscribe to. But every year at least one of the recruiting rankings has a SEC team at the top. This year was no different. Alabama was at the top of Rivals.com’s team rankings, with texas at No. 2. Scout.com flipped them.

Scout’s conference rankings, naturally, had the SEC at the top. In fact, Scout ranked nine of the SEC’s 14 teams in its Top 25. Only one team – Mississippi – was outside the Top 50. Rivals had eight teams in the Top 25.

You get the idea. The SEC is the best in the land. So it’s little wonder that when the SEC invited texas A&M and Missouri to join both schools happily accepted, even though it’s entirely possible both programs will need a few years to acquire enough talent to play at the SEC’s level.

So in a league where the competition is fierce, which team was the big winner and which team was the big loser in the SEC recruiting battle? Let’s find out.

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College football schedules don’t create buzz in December. But, when you’re talking about the Southeastern Conference, it’s another story entirely. The SEC 2012 schedule is out and it doesn’t take a genius to know why that’s important.

In 2012 the SEC will have two new members – Missouri and texas A&M – making college football’s best conference even better. The Aggies bring football-rabid Texans. Missouri brings a unique market for the SEC, where the Tigers are the only FBS team in a state with large media markets in St. Louis and Kansas City.

The schedule is also buzzy because there was speculation that the SEC might revamp its schedule a bit to accommodate its two new members, including going to nine conference games. The SEC decided not to go up to nine conference games for now, so each team will play six games within its division and two outside of its division.

So who won and who lost in the SEC’s 2012 schedule? I’ll have more on that after the jump, including a listing of all 14 team schedules for 2012.

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This LSU vs. Alabama 2011 hype video trailer has me pumped up and waiting for this game! Can’t wait!

But the larger picture for the Aggies isn’t the Big 12, but the SEC, where they’ll land next year. The way the Aggies are playing right now, the Aggies are proving they’re not SEC material yet. I could see them as no better than a fourth-place team in the SEC West. Pencil in losses to LSU, Alabama and Arkansas next season. The games against Auburn and Mississippi State would be tough but evenly matched. The only team I can see the Aggies being a clear favorite over right now is Mississippi.

There are no weak sisters in the SEC. Even Vanderbilt – long the red-headed stepchild of the league – is playing its big brothers tough, or did you miss the Commodores’ near-victory over Arkansas on Saturday? It’s not like the Aggies are going to get a Baylor or an Iowa State or a Kansas to help bolster their record in league play.

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Football season for me starts on Thursday night in Nacogdoches, texas, when my alma mater, Stephen F. Austin, takes on McMurry. Then, two nights later it’s off to Stillwater for Oklahoma State’s game with Louisiana-Lafayette. And then it’s wall-to-wall football until December. At the moment, I have only two weekends with no games on my schedule.

So that brings me to my Top 25 for 2011. You’ve seen just about everyone else’s by now. I’ve put together my own poll for PigskinU.com and the other Website I work for, RoadTripSports.com. I’ll bring you this poll every Monday during the college football season. Because, you know, you need another opinion to clutter up your brain, don’t you?

A couple of ground rules: First, I absolutely hate it when a pollster drops a team a spot or two in his poll, even when the team wins. It’s like saying, “Well, you didn’t beat that team BADLY enough.” I don’t subscribe to that theory. To me, if you win, then you don’t do any worse than stay where you are. I will NEVER punish a team for winning. It’s downright un-American. Continue Reading…

The Wolverines will be one of the surprise teams this season. They’ll have a defense that almost can’t help but get better after last season, and they’ll have quarterback Denard Robinson.  The reason that Michigan-Michigan State made the list is because by the time Michigan-Ohio State rolls around, Michigan won’t be a surprise. The Wolverines might well be the favorite, depending on how Ohio State fares with a new quarterback and under a new coach.

Michigan faded last year after a 5-0 start and Robinson got a lot of the blame. His two worst passing games were in the big rivalry games. He threw three picks against Michigan State. He was generally ineffective against Ohio State, though he ran for 105 yards. Continue Reading…

Spring is usually a time of renewal when it comes to college football. For Alabama, spring football has given way to spring upheaval.

Alabama offensive lineman Aaron Douglas turned up dead in a Fernandina Beach, FL, home on Thursday morning. Local law enforcement is working on the cause of death, but authorities know that Douglas was seen alive as late as 2 a.m. Thursday. Beyond that, they’re still piecing it together. Continue Reading…

Officiating Can Be A Learning Experience

The worlds of college and professional football are pretty secretive and regimented. I learned that covering the NFL for four years. You talk to players when the team lets you talk to players (unless you’re with the major papers, and then you can get their agents or, sometimes, even the players via cell). It’s even worse at the college level, where you get player availability about once a week and sports information directors continually guard the players’ privacy. I know college writers who have players’ cell phone number and get called to the carpet by SIDs once the writer uses the number.

Understandably, those who work for teams and sports leagues want information released on their own terms, not the media’s. So there’s a constant tug of war. When I was in Tampa Bay – during the days of Jon Gruden and Bruce Allen – the team typically won that battle. And they kept track of everything. One day, during a casual conversation with a team official, I found out that the PR staff kept a file of every writer’s clips and that the GM looked at all of them. I could tell when one of the other writers had written something critical of the team. His access seemed to diminish, even if ever so slightly. Continue Reading…