re: Official Week 7 SEC Basketball Power Rankings

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UGA's problem is simple. You went 6-6 in the non-conference. Mizzou went 13-1 in the non-con. The NCAA Tournament Selection Committee, and the sports public at large, cares more about your overall body of work than just your conference record, especially in a league as weak as the SEC is this year. If being 8-4 in league rather than 6-6 mattered so much, wouldn't UGA be on the NCAA tournament bubble right now rather than Mizzou? But they're not.

I will say that conference play is definitely important, and a team improving as year goes on and peaking in the conference schedule is a great thing and Mark Fox has done a great job doing more with less this year. But that alone isn't always enough to push you into the upper echelon. One of my favorite all time Mizzou teams was a team that, like your UGA team this year, lost a whopping 6 games in the non-conference. That Mizzou team improved though as year went on like UGA, went 11-3 in conference and won the Big Eight regular season championship and then the tourney championship. It also cracked the Top 20 national rankinigs at season's end. But the difference was, as part of its journey that Mizzou team beat a couple of Top 15 nationally ranked teams along the way. Georgia's opportunities to do that were Florida and Kentucky but you didn't get it done. That combined with the weakness of the conference is what drags you down despite a nice 8-4 league record.

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