Georgia-Auburn game could be sacrificed in SEC scheduling
The Georgia-Auburn rivalry includes this battle: Uga vs. Robert Baker. (Montgomery Advertiser)
There is a chance that SEC conference expansion will claim one significant victim: The Georgia-Auburn series.
Georgia athletic director Greg McGarity said Wednesday that SEC athletic directors will meet near the end of the month to discuss future football scheduling. With the conference’s addition of Texas A&M and Missouri, the two biggest questions: 1) Will the SEC go to a nine-game conference schedule? 2) Will expansion force for the end of the SEC’s annual East-West rivalry games of Georgia-Auburn and Alabama-Tennessee?
Answer to No. 1: Probably not.
Answer to No. 2: Possibly.
Georgia-Auburn is known as the “Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry,” dating back to 1892. They have played every year since 1898, with three exceptions: 1917, 1918 and 1943. The reasons: World War I and World War II. It appears “Conference Armageddon” may have an equal impact.
The ACC recently announced that teams will begin playing nine-game conference schedules when Pittsburgh and Syracuse officially join the league. McGarity is against the SEC increasing from eight-game schedules and does not sense there’s any movement in that direction. He said nine conference games might necessitate schools dropping a traditional local rivalry. Examples: Georgia-Georgia Tech, Florida-Florida State and South-Carolina-Clemson.
The future of Georgia-Auburn is less certain. Expansion will lead to schools playing six games against division opponents and two against the opposite division. (The current breakdown is five-three.) But there are only two traditional East-West rivalries in the SEC, which could lead to schools rotating opponents from the opposite division.
“I think if you ask Alabama and Tennessee, like us and Auburn, we’d like to retain the games,” McGarity said. “But does that work? What do the other 10 schools think? Those four schools like having those games but there’s no other East-West match-up that has that piece of history to it. So I don’t where that fits in.”
He said athletic directors will study “numerous models” when they meet.
“With 14 teams, not everybody will be happy,” he said. “Some will have a problem with everything. But we’ll make decisions based on the best situation of the league.”
By Jeff Schultz
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522 comments Add your comment
end on a high note
February 10th, 2012
6:54 pm
Well, I don’t want the rivalry to end. I remember sitting on the 50 yard line after the 1980 game, and our group of 4 was politely asked by the remaining security guard in the stadium if we could consider leaving. If it has to end, at least it was with a drubbing of Auburn!
jc-dawgs
February 10th, 2012
7:02 pm
To me….it makes no difference. In fact….until they fix what we currently have….which is a 2 team highly subjective playoff system…..all the other decisions take a back seat.
uGa
February 10th, 2012
9:31 pm
” I’d just ASSUME (?) get to see the other cross division teams more often as play them every year.”—FJR
Hmmm, so this guys a SC fan?
uGa
February 10th, 2012
9:33 pm
“guy’s”, that is.
wild one 13
February 11th, 2012
7:26 am
I think a Alabama player said it best a few years ago ” We hate Auburn because we have to, we hate Tennesse because we want to”!
To cancel this game would be a crying sheme.
The Governors
February 11th, 2012
10:17 am
“sheme” or scheme?
Something for the young GT crowd
February 11th, 2012
5:15 pm
I am 63 now and I do recall being BOTH a GT and UGA fan as a kid. My grandfather was a GT alum AND a PROF there. I leaned toward GT in HS but once I went to Athens and viewed UGA whupping NC in a regional football game, I decided that is where I would attend and so, I did for 6 years. I have never regretted this and retired at 57 to boot!!
So, GT’s biggest rivals for folks my age were ……………… UT and AU and Alabama and sometimes but not often, Florida, where Bobby Dodd’s son played third string QB.
As a young man by the time GT dropped their three big rivals………..AU and UT and sometimes Florida, they began their spiral down and except for the pro rata share of the MNC in 1990, it has been nothing exciting in GT football. I really hated seeing Tech lose Auburn and UT especially. THEY WERE HUGE GT traditions. As big nearly as UGA then.
Nowadays, UGA does not consider the GT game as of world shattering importance, like we once did, along with Auburn, Tennesse and SEC squads.
Now? GT looks to Clemson and VA tech and that is about it. Maybe, maybe NC.
UGA man
class of 71 & 73
traditions
February 11th, 2012
9:18 pm
hope we can keep them
@TDF
February 11th, 2012
9:22 pm
Spitting water all over your computer sounds about right for you.
OK
February 11th, 2012
9:33 pm
and Donnan was a great coachster
9 game conf. schedule = no more great matchups
February 12th, 2012
1:56 am
Will the SEC go to a nine-game conference schedule?
pfft, 9 game conference schedule? HA. If the SEC had a 9 game conference schedule we’d never see the great matchups like what we saw last year: Florida vs Furman; Alabama vs Kent State; Western Kentucky and LSU? From what I recall that was a classic game. Lets not forget UGA vs Coastal Carolina … such a memorable game, what was it … 59-0.
A 9 game conference schedule would rid us of these great matchups! So I say, drop Auburn! Coastal Carolina is where all the fun is at now
TennFanForLife
February 12th, 2012
8:16 am
If there was a real playoff system in place all these arguments would poof just go away,,,,
mizzou
February 12th, 2012
9:36 pm
putting missouri in the east to make alabama happy–maybe the dumbest thing I’ve seen in sports in 9 years. Auburn should be in the east, missouri in the west. Hello???? look at the map.
Gooddawg
February 13th, 2012
7:57 am
There is plenty of room for a nine game SEC schedule and still retain the good rivalries. Let me see, Buffalo, Florida Atlantic, Georgia Southern. There’s at least two we don’t need.
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February 13th, 2012
9:15 am
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9:25 am
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@mizzou
February 13th, 2012
10:07 am
Geography means nothing in sports, especially in today’s college football. I still remember when the Atlanta Falcons and Braves were stuck playing in the western divisons for years.
JRsec
February 13th, 2012
2:03 pm
There is a solution, but the Bammers want Auburn seperated from UGA and recruiting in the state of Georgia. Move Kentucky and Missouri to the West and Auburn and Alabama to the East. Bama would have UT & Auburn would have UGA and the conference could stay at 8 games without affecting longstanding, longloved rivalries. The conference has been tilted West for football and East for basketball for some time now. This should give the East a slight advantage while allowing A&M and Mizzou time to catch up. LSU and Arkansas are plenty tough and MIss State is catching up. Football would be balanced in a couple of years and basketball even sooner.
italian_29
February 13th, 2012
4:34 pm
George Stein, I think that the overall record of
263-130-10 (.665) all-time advantage is a more telling stat than to just pull a random year I.E. 2007.
Read more from original site: http://www.secsportsfan.com/sec-vs-acc-football.html#ixzz1mIeQOP85
Tony
February 13th, 2012
11:01 pm
The Dawgs need to keep this rivalry. Why not get rid of Western Carolinal or Georgia Southern?
C3P
February 15th, 2012
1:47 pm
When the SEC went to 2 divisions, Auburn sacrificed its tradition of playing GA Tech ( the other long rivalry in southeast). We also lost out on a budding rivalry with FSU. Now we are told to sacrifice the longest rivalry in the southeast. Really? For what, greed of media revenue? Well why not look at the revenue generated by 110 year old tradition with two 85+K stadiums that sell out? I think that alone is good enough reason to start putting tradition and rivalries before division play. We are losing the very nature of what makes college football better than NFL. Wake up commissioners! You’re gonna kill the golden goose.
Mike Bradford
February 15th, 2012
4:54 pm
I didn’t want to add two more teams to the conference anyway. Keep Alabama-Tennessee and Georgie-Auburn.