quote:
is a shite metric. You should know from firsthand experience wathcing bama beat up on Miami and FSU teams in season openers that were ranked nicely but barely finished above .500

That's a fair point and for that reason I decided to recalculate the numbers to include playoff and bowl games as well as ranked opponents based on their ranking in the final AP poll (after the nat'l championship game). Only other difference this time is I compared the last 7 seasons (including the current season) for both coaches to see how the numbers compare. This did change the number of ranked teams each team played in Georgia's favor.

What didn't change however was how incredibly even both Saban and Smart's win/loss records as well as the number of national and SEC titles each has won. The nearly identical records across both 7 year time spans (comparing Saban 2008-2014 to Smart's 2017-2023 and now both coaches 2017-2023 to 2017-2023) is remarkable.

Kirby Smart (2017-2023) - Georgia played 35 opponents who finished ranked in the final AP poll

Overall record from 2017 to current: 84-10 (89.4%)

National titles - 2 (2021, 2022)

SEC titles - 2 (2017, 2022)

Nick Saban (2017-2023) - Alabama played 31 opponents who finished ranked in the final AP poll

Overall record from 2017 to current: 85-9 (90.4%)

National titles - 2 (2017, 2020)

SEC titles - 3 (2018, 2020, 2021)

It's incredible how even Smart and Saban's records over the last 7 seasons are. If both teams take care of business this Saturday and Georgia beats Alabama in Atlanta they'll have identical 86-10 records since the start of the 2017 season, the same number of SEC titles (3) and the same number of national titles (2) with Kirby having a chance to break the national title tie as well as an opportunity to push his overall win/loss record over this time span just past Saban's.

This post was edited on 11/22/23 at 3:43 pm