SEC Coach's Hot Seat

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Safe - second-year Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino, the only returning SEC football coach who had a losing season in 2008. The Razorbacks, who fielded one of the youngest teams in the country, actually made significant progress under Petrino.

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The nine returning coaches in SEC basketball also have fewer reasons than usual to be worried about job security. In a league dominated by underclassmen in 2008-09, the large majority of teams will be improved next season. And an improved team rarely leads to the firing of its coach.

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When the next school year begins, neither SEC football nor men's basketball has an obvious candidate for the proverbial coaching hot seat.

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In a league as competitive and high-paying as this one, there are only two ways for a coach to avoid criticism: win the most recent national championship game or take Vanderbilt to a bowl game.

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Bobby Johnson led Vanderbilt to a victory over Boston College in the Music City Bowl last December. He's good for another 27 years.

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Three SEC football coaches and three men's basketball coaches were fired this past school year. But that isn't necessarily bad news for the coaches in those sports who weren't fired.

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A firing storm of that magnitude is usually followed by a lull. In the aftermath, there's no SEC football coach who's on the brink of becoming an ex-SEC football coach.

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Tennessee, Auburn and Mississippi State just hired new coaches. Not even SEC programs fire football coaches after one season. So Lane Kiffin (UT), Gene Chizik (Auburn) and Dan Mullen (Mississippi State) are safe - as is second-year Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino.

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So how do you fill that void?

Best answer: By scrutinizing three of the SEC's most successful coaches - South Carolina's Steve Spurrier, Georgia's Mark Richt and LSU's Les Miles.

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Spurrier's Florida teams dominated the conference in the 1990s, and he's second only to Alabama's Bear Bryant for his coaching impact on SEC football. Certainly, he has improved South Carolina's program.

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It's not his record, so much as his offense, that's in question.

Miles' first three years at LSU were the best three years in school history. LSU fans are focusing on his fourth season, the first in which he didn't benefit from the players recruited by his predecessor, attributed, in part, to the coaching staff's selection of a quarterback and Miles' decision to use co-defensive coordinators.

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You have to look really hard to find shortcomings in Richt's eight-year run at Georgia. But SEC fans do look really hard.

Georgia has won three SEC championships, finished second nationally in 2007, and has been the most consistent program in the conference this decade.

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The presence of Saban at Alabama and Urban Meyer doesn't help Richt. They come across as tougher, more intense coaches, who are obsessed with winning. Moreover, both won big last season against Georgia.

Never mind that Georgia beat Alabama and Florida in 2007. SEC fans have short memories.

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