Conference realignment within college football is seemingly a never-ending process. After the upcoming season, Oklahoma and Texas are expected to move into the SEC. With the addition of Texas and Oklahoma, the SEC will balloon to 16 teams. As a result, many have called for the league to eliminate divisions and expand its in-conference schedule to nine games. Recently, LSU Head Coach Brian Kelly echoed those sentiments while speaking to ESPN.
“I’ve been in this for three decades, and no disrespect to any of the other schools that we play outside of the SEC, but they just don’t excite me,” Kelly said.
“I want to play the best. I came down here to the SEC because I wanted to play against Alabama. I want to play A&M. I want to play Auburn, the great teams, and in our new scheduling we get to play Alabama every year, Ole Miss every year and A&M, and that’s really why I came down here. I want to play those games, and I think playing nine SEC games is great for your schedule, and it prepares you for the opportunity to play for a championship but also play for the national championship.”
Kelly’s fellow SEC coach, Nick Saban, also echoed his sentiments, but the University of Alabama coach has concerns about how those expanded schedules would be constructed.
“I’ve always been an advocate for playing more [conference] games,” Saban told Sports Illustrated.
“But if you play more games, I think you have to get the three fixed [opponents] right. They’re giving us Tennessee, Auburn and LSU. I don’t know how they come to that [decision].”
