Free Republic

Former SEC Commissioner Roy Kramer, who became a pioneer for college football's current playoff structure, has died at age 96, the conference announced. Kramer served as the SEC’s commissioner from 1990 to 2002 and made it one of the richest conferences in the nation during his tenure, mostly by negotiating lucrative television contracts. He began by bringing Arkansas and South Carolina into the conference in 1991 — a small preview of the massive expansion that has overrun the sport and college athletics in today’s era. That allowed him to introduce the SEC title game, which added to a growing fount...

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — As the SEC reviews ways to halt field and court storming, Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne has come up with a proposal, according to a recent interview. "I truly believe [in forfeiting wins] — if we said that the home team, if they storm the field or the court, they're going to lose that game right then and there, that will stop it."Alabama AD Greg Byrne told ESPN The league has seen rise in recent years of fans taking celebration to playing surfaces and Arkansas is one of them. After upsetting then No. 4 Tennessee in Razorbacks...

Blinn College quarterback Cameron Newton on New Year’s Eve committed to Auburn University marking his return to the Southeastern Conference where he began his college career. Newton led the Buccaneers to the NJCAA championship in early December and was considered the top junior college recruit in the country.

College football has been conquered, in nearly every respect, by the Deep South. The Southeastern Conference, a 76-year-old coalition of 12 universities in nine Southern states stretching from Louisiana to Florida, has won three national college football titles in five years, including the last two by blowout, and has an unrivaled 11-4 record in the Bowl Championship Series since 1999. Its teams lead the nation in average attendance, have five of the 12 highest-paid coaches in college football and just signed two broadcast deals worth as much as $3 billion over the next 15 years. Tomorrow, Alabama and Florida, ranked...

THE BCS NATIONAL TITLE GAME vs. Florida vs Ohio State (-7) The BCS National Title game is being played in Glendale, Arizona and features the BCS #1 team and Big Ten conference champion Ohio State Buckeyes vs. the BCS #2 and SEC Conference champion Florida Gators. Being that this is the National Title game as we know it, I’ll break it down by groups. Feel free to disagree if you like, but I’ll do my level best to keep it even here. Ohio State’s offensive line vs. Florida’s defensive line: This is one of 3 critical match-ups in the game....

AUBURN, Ala., Oct. 14 — It can be a merciless existence in the Southeastern Conference, with a team’s schedule stacked with Top 25 opponents and fierce crowds of up to 107,000 people screaming from start to finish at a visiting squad. Given all that, it was not exactly surprising that No. 2 Florida, trying to stay in the national championship hunt, was finally taken down by the SEC gantlet here Saturday night in Jordan-Hare Stadium. The Gators were surrounded by a howling crowd of 87,541, which revved up the Auburn defense in the second half as the No. 11 Tigers...

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — The SEC is first among Division I athletic conferences in annual revenues, first in football attendance and was the first league to stage a championship football game. But the SEC is last in another important category. With the hiring of Mike Shula at Alabama and Rich Brooks at Kentucky during the off-season, the SEC remains the only major conference that never has hired a black head football coach. The lack of minority coaches plagues college football nationwide, with only four black head coaches at the 117 Division I-A schools. But nowhere is the issue more visible than...