I was seated in my library last night, doing intense research. I started to reach for the Trap-A-Crap spray when I noticed on a book shelf (Basket of magazines by the Rheem) a well worn Sporting News College Football mag. I decided to look through and see how some of their predictions were coming out. Their top 10 went:
Alabama
Clemson
Oklahoma
Ohio State
Baylor
Florida State
Ole Miss
Michigan
Stanford
Notre Dame
No surprises in the predictions. The usual suspects with a couple of exceptions. (Cough..cough...Ole Miss) But at the mid point of the season, that's a big 50% fail. Anyway, Sporting News did an interesting thing at the start of each conference preview. They took the 247 Composite and listed the number of 5, 4 and 3 star signings for each team. I know that on a given year, we might not fare well in our match ups with another conference. I think the ACC got us pretty good a year or two ago. But for the most part, I think the numbers work out in the SEC's favor and the bottom line is that no conference comes close in the areas of winning and playing for MNC's and having the greatest number of teams consistently in the top 25. Playing favorites? Bias? Nope. Here's why.
First off, to group the Non-Power 5 Conferences together, the American Athletic, Mountain West, MAC, Sunbelt and Conference USA signed a combined total of 1 Five Star and 6 Four Star players. That's between a total of 61 teams. Now, for the Power 5:
ACC signed 2 Five Stars and 48 Four Stars (14 Teams)
Big 10 signed 3 Five Stars and 60 Four Stars (14 Teams)
Big 12 signed 1 Five Star and 43 Four Stars (10 Teams)
Pac 12 signed 3 Five Stars and 57 Four Stars (12 Teams)
SEC signed
14 Five Stars and 108 Four Stars (14 Teams)
I've said many times that the assigned stars are not indicative of whether or not a player will be a stud at the D1 level. But when you stockpile 4 and 5 star kids, your team can't help but be successful.(Unless your coach has his head up his ass) These numbers are just for this past recruiting class, but I imagine they're fairly consistent through the years. So why is the SEC always in yo face?