Who are the biggest brand names in the SEC?
Now that Mario Cristobal has moved to Miami, it got us thinking this off-season about who the biggest ‘names’ in college football are. There were the Notre Dames, Alabamas, and Texases, but other names – Oregon, Oklahoma and Penn State popped up. A decision to put Nebraska there after years of success under Tom Osborne was given a “What in the **** have you done lately?”.
So here’s my list of SEC brand powers, and the very reasons why (or why not!).
- Alabama: Bear Bryant, Houndstooth hats, National Championships both real and claimed, and Nick Saban. If you win in Tuscaloosa, you are God. Nick Saban is now God. If Notre Dame has ‘mystique’ because of Rudy, ‘Bama’ has mystique because they win, win and win some more. And because now they have become a NFL supply line, it’s even bigger. Oh, and there’s a brilliant song from the ‘Drive By Truckers’ about the importance of football in Alabama (which mentions Bear Bryant, too.
- LSU: Although Georgia has recruited great class after great class, LSU is more the blue blood. And has more National Championships. But not only that, people seem to drone on about the ‘Saturday Night in Death Valley‘, the great tailgate scene (yes, because no-one has ever been drunk at a college football tailgate outside of LSU), and the fact that LSU fans want their coach dead and buried after one season. LSU fans are also spread into the Southwest, meaning that the purple and gold is….everywhere. Oh, and there’s the Earthquake Game, too.
- Georgia: The hedges, Herschel Walker, the Green Bay Packers ‘G’ and Larry Munson’s great calls are some reasons why Georgia is a legendary place. But the fact that it’s had exactly 0 National Championships since 1980 has actually made them a bit of a laughing stock. But Georgia’s recent building-up of recruiting might, the fact that they are consistently there or thereabouts in the SEC running (most of the time winning the East lately), makes them a huge SEC brand.
- Florida: Florida was a bit of a SEC backwater until Steve Spurrier arrived. Suddenly words like “Fun and Gun” were thrown out, the Gators-Noles game became a must-watch, the Spurrier’s quip factor made headlines around the world. Then it was Urban Meyer, the speeches of Tim Tebow, all the while the Gators fans chomped, chomped, chomped in The Swamp. Lately the Will Muschamp, Jim McElwain and Dan Mullen has dampened down the brand, making it a little more ‘laughing stock’ than ‘often talked about’.
- Kentucky: Football-wise, it would be the bottom echelon. But for basketball, there’s no doubt that this is the SEC’s biggest team, or the SEC’s biggest blue blood.
- Auburn: Whether Auburn fans like it or not, Auburn is Alabama’s ‘little brother’, despite being pretty successful in their own rights. And although Bo Jackson and Charles Barkley bring some allure to the Plains, the big fact is this – Auburn’s more celebrated for its batshit-crazy games (50% of them in a season always seem to be head-scratchers) – than something consistent. Think about it: If I was to ask you what college football team you thought of in Alabama, what would you say: Auburn or U of A?
- Tennessee: Maybe it’s Peyton Manning, or the checkered end-zones, or the ‘Big Orange’. Or the ‘T’. Or that a packed Neyland Stadium is one of the noisest places in the SEC. But Tennessee’s success- or lack of it – has taken a shine off the program. Still weird to think that Spurrier completely owned Peyton Manning for his whole life.
- Ole Miss: When someone talks to you about Ole Miss, what is the first thing you think of? That’s right, The Grove. You don’t think about the football of Hugh Freeze and Lane Kiffin, you think of The Grove and if you’re a journalist like me – Wright Thompson talking lustily about Oxford, MS. Remember, the football for years before Freeze was utter crap.
- Texas A&M: It’s weird to say they are so low on the list, but let’s be honest, how many SEC schools consider Texas A&M a rival? Maybe Arkansas? Certainly not LSU. Or Alabama. Or Auburn. Excitement about Johnny Football brought new eyes to Aggie Football, but since then, there have been a lot of blanks. Now, this will change in a few years’ time, but even the incredible three tiers of Kyle Field, Midnight Yells and feeling that you’re one step away from a recreation of David Koresh and the Branch of The Davidians can’t make it ‘that bigger’ of a SEC brand. But right now, it’s not.
- Arkansas: Still considered by many as being out-of-place in the SEC, Arkansas got itself a bit more recognition with Darren McFadden and Felix Jones, but then gave it all back with Bobby Petrino and his escapades. The ‘Woo Piiiig’ chant gets people going, but like Texas A&M, do the SEC really care about them? If Sam Pittman continues to make them competitive, then yes.
- Mississippi State: The Cowbells are the biggest name-recognition for Mississippi State, who are – like Auburn is for Alabama – considered ‘Little Brother’ in The Magnolia State. It hasn’t helped that they had an under .500 streak from 2001 to 2006, either. They aren’t even thought of as being a great baseball school in the outside world…because no-one seems to care about below-MLB baseball…unless it’s the Little League World Series.
- South Carolina: The best thing about South Carolina is the entrance tune: 2001. As college football goes, Steve Spurrier generated a lot of excitement in Columbia (and one SEC Championship), but if we’re really honest, the name recognition is now Clemson’s. South Carolina is now seen as a lower-tier SEC school, and not a great brand name, either.
- Vanderbilt: Whether we like or not, people have heard of Vanderbilt University. Some would even say that it’s just below the Ivy Leagues in terms of intelligence, which makes it the SEC’s most academically prestigious brand. That’s why it’s not in last place. If it was just for the football, it would be 100th-and-something right behind Virginia High School in Bristol, Tennessee.
- Missouri: A horrible thing to say about ‘MIZ-ZOU!’ but people still think of Missouri as a Big 12 schools. Heck, Missouri fans found it somewhat weird that they were invited into the SEC, but said thank you for the money. Missouri struggles for name recognition in the SEC, so much so that if you asked someone who wasn’t a Mizzou fan about what SEC school would be top of their naming list, perhaps 1 in 100 would name Missouri. Great journalism school, though.
