Setting aside all of the inevitable tangents, this thread is actually interesting.

One of the tangents dealt with the question of "Why are y'all only talking 'bout the White folks?" and the follow-up point that many (if not "most") SEC athletes are African-American. LOOK AT THE THREAD TITLE.

It says "SEC people" - not "SEC athletes." I interpret that term as a reference to actual former students, rather than sidewalk fans, and the simple fact is that the student body and alumni base of any SEC school is primarily of European descent (like it or not).

For example, the current population at TAMU contains a bit less than three percent Blacks. It was lowe when I attended in the 1980s, and the alumni base is probably less than two percent. I would be surprised if most SEC schools vary much from those numbers.

With that being said, it is difficult to generalize about the ancestry of a student body because the student body of any major university draws from so-wide a geographical area. For example, TAMU has students from dozens of foreign countries, most US States and almost all of Texas' 254 Counties.

Some of those Counties are majority-Hispanic, and some are largely Anglo. In some, it is difficult to find a surname that does not derive from the area that is now Germany. (Recall that no country of "Germany" existed at the time that most Americans' ancestors left Europe.).

So, why don't we look at the areas around the SEC schools themselves. Again, I will use TAMU as an example. I will also use myself.

The school is located in Brazos County (note the Spanish-derived name). Like all of Texas before the 1820s, the area had a few Native American inhabitants and a small number of Spanish and mestizo settlers, primarily via Mexico. To my knowledge, I have no ancestors from this period.

The first non-Hispanic settlers in the area were led by Moses Austin, and later his son Stephen. Moses was born in Connecticut, moved to Virginia and eventually settled in Missouri. The settlers led by Austin came most-recently from the Old South, but many (like the Austins) had roots elsewhere. These folks were the vast majority of the area prior to Texas independence. My TAMU-area ancestors among these settlers came from Mississippi and had typical Scots-Irish surnames.

After Independence and before the War between the States, most immigration to Texas came from the Old South, but much also came direct from Europe. Little of the European immigration came to the Brazos County area, but some of the "Germans" who settled near San Antonio are among my ancestors. My Irish ancestors came to the Houston area during this period.

After the War, the area saw large influxes from Italy and areas now part of the Czech Republic and then part of the Austrian Empire. The latter group contained more of my ancestors. Refugees from the Old South also came to Texas (and Brazos County) in great numbers. My surname derives from these Southern refugees.

So, the TAMU offshoot of SEC People are mutts. Me too.