Saturday is a great example of how the SEC doesn't understand scheduling in playoff era

Lets look at the teams that have went the farthest in the 12-team bracket:

2024 Texas - very soft 2-game regular season schedule
2025 Ole Miss - very soft 2-game regular season schedule

It is very clear FOR YEARS - even before the 12-team - that the Big Ten crafts schedules for their power schools to protect them as much as possible. Some of that is simply because they do not have as many historically great teams but it happens so consistently that it can't be unplanned.

Why in God's name does Sankey allow scheduling where their two most dominant programs of the last decade play each other then play one of their biggest historical rivals the next week?

The goal should be to get your best teams to the finish line in this era. Outright protection rackets, not making schedules for whatever the Mouse thinks is the most compelling TV. One conference in the Power 2 understands the goal is to get your best programs to the playoffs without being ground to dust. However, Georgia each of the last two seasons has been gassed after winning the SEC v. two fairly strong schedules.

Sankey continues to amaze me at how incompetent, naive, or otherwise dull he is about the modern era of ball.