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Week 7 SEC Power Rankings

By Justin Strawn

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Sep 6, 2014; Gainesville, FL, USA; A SEC marker on the field during the second half between the Florida Gators and the Eastern Michigan Eagles at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Florida Gators defeated the Eastern Michigan Eagles 65-0. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports

What an incredible week that week 6 was for college football. Saturday was billed as the biggest day in the history of college football for the state of Mississippi. The Mississippi schools took full advantage of it. Mississippi State throttled the Aggies. Ole Miss shocked everyone with their upset of Alabama. Auburn made their claim for the top of the pack with a 41-7 dismantling of the LSU Tigers. So who should be on top for the #1 spot in the Power Rankings? Let’s make the case for all three (in alphabetical order)

Auburn
Auburn has a 5-0 record and 2-0 in the SEC. They have two really good wins. They went to Kansas State and beat them. They embarrassed LSU in Jordan Hare. For good measure, they beat Arkansas before we believed the Razorbacks were any good. They have been the most consistent team of the three vying for the top spot.

Mississippi State
No one has proven more people wrong in the first 5 games of the season than Mississippi State. Few believed they could go on the road and beat LSU. When they did, a lot of people thought it was a fluke and the pass defense would cost them in their game against Texas A&M. They proved that wasn’t the case either. Every time someone thinks they have found a weakness in the Bulldogs, Mississippi State proves those people wrong. The accumulation of their two best wins is the best of the three.

Ole Miss
We didn’t know what to make of Ole Miss until this past weekend. The Rebels are for real. They have unquestionably the best win of the three. The question is does that give  the Rebels the clear advantage over the Bulldogs and Tigers even though there is more depth to their resume?

And the top spot goes to…
Mississippi State. Asking me to choose between the three teams is just too difficult right now, so I am going to just simply move the three up based on where they were last week. That means Mississippi State goes to 1, Auburn jumps to 2, and Ole Miss jumps to 3. This will get further sorted out this week when Auburn travels to Davis Wade Stadium to take on the Bulldogs. So here are the rest of the rankings.

  1. Mississippi State 5-0 (Last Week 2) See above.
  2. Auburn 5-0 (Last Week 4) See above.
  3. Ole Miss 5-0 (Last Week 5) See above.
  4. Alabama 4-1 (Last Week 1) The Crimson Tide came out and laid an egg in the second half. They were the beneficiaries of a terrible call at the end of the first half, and instead of coming out and stuffing the Rebels, they made mistake after mistake. Very atypical of a Saban coached team.
  5. Georgia 4-1 (Last Week 9) Let’s all welcome an SEC East team back to the top half of the rankings. I’m not sure this team is very good, but Todd Gurley is amazing. He may be their best hope of winning the East.
  6. Texas A&M 5-1 (Last Week 3) I moved them down last week because I thought the Aggies showed some major flaws against Arkansas. The Bulldogs used that and trounced the Aggies. There is still tons of talent on this team, but they need to fill in the gaps pretty quickly.
  7. Arkansas 3-2 (Last Week 7) The Hogs stay put during their bye week, and are rewarded with a mad Crimson Tide team coming to town.
  8. LSU 4-2 (Last Week 6) I don’t believe the Tigers are a bad team, but I also see that the Tigers may only end up with 7 or 8 wins. It’s tough to win games against the SEC West when you have terrible quarterback play, and that is what the Tigers are fighting right now.
  9. Missouri 4-1 (Last Week 8) They fall one spot because Georgia moved up. They could catapult themselves up the board if they beat those Bulldogs this weekend.
  10. Kentucky 4-1 (Last Week 12) Are the Wildcats good? I don’t know, but they are certainly better than they were last year. With every team in the East having at least one loss, the Wildcats could conceivably win the East. I don’t think they will, but they are certainly looking more and more like a football team with each passing week.
  11. Florida 3-1 (Last Week 11) Did you really think that win would get the Gators moved up?
  12. South Carolina 3-3 (Last Week 10) The Gamecocks aren’t good. At all. 6-6 or somewhere around there is looking pretty likely.
  13. Tennessee 2-3 (Last Week 13) There are better days in the future for the Vols, but they may not make it here this year.
  14. Vanderbilt 1-5 (Last Week 14) The Commodores have a winnable game against Charleston Southern this weekend. Notice I used winnable and not easy win.

The top will get even more defined this week with Mississippi State and Auburn this week squaring off. We also see how Ole Miss will handle coming back down to Earth after such an emotional win. Going to Kyle Field to face a Texas A&M team with adversity is never easy. Power Rankings will take shape even more. Should be a lot of fun.

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