[2023] SEC quarter-season state

[tsweezy]

After 3.5 weeks of play, most schools have wrapped up their OOC games and now we can take a little quick peek and see how they are performing vis-a-vis my initial preseason power rankings for each conference. First up: the SEC:

 

Team	Conf	Overall	Preseason Power Rank	Game 1	Game 2	Game 3	Game 4	New Rank	Rank change	Notes
Georgia	0-0	3-0	3	W at MICH 42-14	W vs STAN 10-6	W vs BGSU 35-16		1	2	In a SOS  sense, UGA might have had the best opening Non-Conference wins in the country. However they didn't exactly run away with all of them, and Stanford nearly took them down. Still, quality wins*tm* mean something so they get the 1 spot with many more hard games to come
Tennessee	0-0	3-0	4	W vs UMD, 45-7	W at FSU, 40-21	W vs Southern Miss 33-3		2	2	The games haven't been close so far and the pollsters love the Volunteers, but FSU laying an egg vs. UTST makes this slate much less impressive. Not coronating them as the runaway favorites quite yet
Auburn	0-0	3-0	10	W at TROY 57-13	W at Duke 40-6	W vs Mich St. 28-3		3	7	Auburn has had a blistering start out of the gate looking terrifying behind Andrew Moncrief, who has looked like a national Tier 1 QB and currently has the highest QBR in the country with a ton of yardage. They play UGA next and we'll see if they're the West favorite, or just played some bad teams
LSU	1-0	2-1	6	W at ODU 31-13	L vs TCU 14-17	W vs ARK 27-7		4	2	LSU had a squad coming into the year, and so far have been relatively impressive. I have TCU as an easy top-10 team nationally and they were within a field goal, and have 2 solid wins. They haven't quite looked tier 1, but we can call them a 1b team in the SEC so far
Mississippi State	0-0	3-0	13	W vs FCS 35-3	W vs Southern Miss 31-28	W at WYOM 31-7		5	8	The most surprising 3-0 team in conference. I did not think they'd be great this year, but they are already 3-0 OOC. A tough victory over southern miss wasn't super endearing, but they deserve some respect at this point
Kentucky	1-0	1-1	2	L at USC 20-44	W at VAND 44-10			6	-4	I had Kentucky as a top-5 team in the nation if things clicked. Unfortunately they kicked off against my current #1 team and Longacre absolutely scorched this defense. They did look good when smoking Vandy, so perhaps they are still great and had an off night against the #1 team. Very interested to see their floor/ceiling spread
Florida	0-0	2-0	11	W at CLEM 23-20	W vs FIU 35-20			7	4	A gutsy good win against Clemson to kick it off and then beat out FIU. Florida is looking a little better than I inititally predicted but 2 games are still a small sample. If they can keep it relatively close to TENN their future looks bright indeed
South Carolina	0-0	2-0	12	W vs NW 48-36	W at UNC 26-7			8	4	Beating NW was a great first win, and they crushed UNC as well. I thought they would seriously miss Kemoko their all-start QB who's playing on Sundays, but this has been a great team effort so far
Arkansas	0-1	2-2	5	W vs ARKST 34-14	L vs OKLA 24-38	W at CCU 40-17	L at LSU 7-27	9	-4	Arkansas had high goals this season, but has looked pretty average so far. Expected wins vs. ARKST and CCU, but took the L vs Oklahoma and a pivotal game at LSU. To be in serious contention for the West I think they needed to split those, and I think it'll be another year of being number 3-4 in their division
Alabama	0-0	0-2	1	L at COLO 0-41	L at JMU 3-20			10	-9	wow, what a fall from grace for the defending champs. Against Colorado they gained 2 first downs and had 80 yards of total offense. They switched up their gameplan and had 3 points the next game. At this point they may hold open tryouts to find anybody who can play QB worth a damn
Ole Miss	0-0	1-2	9	L at SDSU 30-21	W at WMU 21-13	L vs MINN 17-24		11	-2	About what you'd expect. They had an ambitious OOC slate, and had 2 close losses and a nice dub over the national runner-ups. The season could go in any direction from here, although I don't think they're in serious contention for the division
Texas A&M	0-0	1-1	8	L at LOU 3-25	W vs FCS 27-0			12	-4	Very little info here. An FCS win means zilch to me, and losing to louisville could be expected or could be bad. Not a lot to say, I think they're in their own heads
Missouri	0-0	0-2	7	L at Marshall 20-24	L vs ILLI 17-23			13	-6	A fall from grace. They were in the East divisional race last year and now are losing to Marshall and at home to Illinois. This team still has some talent, but it is just looking very sloppy and rudderless
Vanderbilt	0-1	1-2	14	W vs South Alab. 38-0	L at TEX 7-42	L vs UKEN 10-44		14	0	lol Vandy

 

 

Overall OOC record: 22-13 (.628)

Biggest surprise (good): Auburn

Biggest surprise (bad): Alabama

They are who we thought they were: Vanderbilt

Number of (currently assumed) nationally relevant teams: 6.5

[Sarge]

I know our offense laid an egg against Stanford but I don't think they can be underestimated ROS. Auburn will be the defacto measuring stick coming up as is could be a top 5 v top 5 depending on how the polls swing week 5 matchup.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with our defense playing bend don't break where last year our defense was a top 5 unit in the country and lost a lot of talent. Yancey is a huge loss for us on the DL going into the Auburn game but we've recruited well and hopefully I can fill the gap.