AU6X

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Do sec teams ever get 4 seeds OU seems like we went from a site fire number 2 to maybe a 4

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Nah. The 4s are your auto qualifiers. If you aren’t a 3, you aren’t in.

(The Google actually says it’s happened 2X — gata in 2019 and bammers in 2014-ish)

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1971--Alabama, Ole Miss, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, LSU

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I don’t know about the other schools, but Auburn integrated basketball in ‘68 and football in ‘69.

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Allow me to retort: We went 9-3 at Texas A&M, at Miss State, at Arkansas, and at Ole Miss We’ve only lost one series all season in large part because Aidan King for Florida pitched out of his mind against on Friday.

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UGA would still be one of the best teams if not still the best team. I just don’t think the title would be out of reach going into the last weekend of the season if you only play one of the teams (instead of all 3).

UGA certainly could have improved its RPI stock with its pre-con schedule — 1 whole game away from Athens, and that was at Kennesaw.

But RPI also got screwed by the SEC schedule — LSU, SoCar and Mizzou all at home. Not your fault those teams suck, but you should also at least acknowledge (1) having the good luck of them being on your schedule and (2) playing them at home made for a very easy 9 of your 21 wins.

Baseball RPI is not the be-all-end-all (it can be gamed by playing chump games on the road or at neutral sites), but conf schedules somewhat flatten that out.

Current Top 8 of RPI is 1 UCLA, 2 Tech, 3 AU, 4 UTx, 5 UNC, 6 bammer, 7 FSU * 8USCw. Of those 8, AU has the most Q1 games (25), has 4 more scheduled this week, and will likely play 1+ more in Hoover (and Arky is presently RPI 26 – move up 1 spot and that’s 3 more Q1 games). In descending, order the Q1 games played for the remaining top 8 RPI team: bammer (23), UTx (22), Tech (21), FSU (18), UNC (14) & UCLA and USCw way down the list with 10 and 8. I just don’t see how in the world AU doesn’t finish w the top strength of schedule (Current Top 10 overall SOS is AU, UF, Ole Miss, bammer, FSU, UTx, okie, MSU, Wake, VaTech.)

A few more general interesting RPI notes. SEC has 9 of the Top 20 RPI teams this week. UGA is next to lowest in that group at 14. Only 4 teams have 0 Q3/4 losses: AU, bully, OMiss & Okie. SEC reg season champ UGA has 4 Q3/4 losses. aTm only has 2 Q2 games this season – none in the SEC (2 Q3 series in conf – home vs Vandy & away at Mizzou). Every SEC team that played Mizzou and SoCar at home has a Q4 conference series (AU played Mizzou in CoMo, thankfully). Bammer dropped 1 spot in RPI this week after losing at Troy but sweeping SoCar on the road.

USCw is #8 RPI, and that makes no sense. They are 0-8 in Q1 games, overall SOS is 40, NCSOS is 96, & KPI and DSR are both #21. It shouldn’t host (much less be in contention for a national seed), but bet the Committee gives either it or Nebraska (RPI 15) a host spot over a more deserving SEC team. (For instance, OMiss RPI is 13, DSR is 16, and KPI is 13. They only host if they take 2/3 in Tuscaloosa, and that will probably just knock another SEC team out of hosting.)

AU vs UCLA RPI comparison is very interesting. Since 4/1, AU has played 1 Q3 (N Samford) and 1 Q4 (H vs Ala St). In that same window, UCLA has played 6 Q3 games (both B10 series) and 5 Q4 games. UCLA’s series at Mich St (RPI # 123) would have been Q4 if played in LA. AU has 4 Away Q1 conf series – uat, aTm, UF, and bully. All 4 would have still been Q1 games if Auburn had played them at home. UCLA has 2 B10 away series (Iowa and OSU) that would be Q3 if played at home and 1(Rutgers) that would be Q4 if played at home. UCLA may be the best team in the country, but are they battle tested?

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A&M is out of NS contention. If they lose the next two series as predicted, they may not even host … no Friday pitching is a major Achilles heel.

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This idea isn’t original to me — the baseball guys on the Southeastern Sixteen podcast theorize the averaging out the RPI, DSR, and KPI is probably a sound predictor for hosting seeding decisions for the committee. If that’s close to accurate:

Natl seeds:

UTx - 3.67
AU - 4.3
aTm - 7.0
UAT - 7.67

Hosting:

MSU - 9.67
UF - 10
UGA - 11

2 seeds:

Arky - 22.7
OM - 23
UTn - 26.3
UK - 30

Bubble:

LSU - 45
Vandy - 55.7

Of course, it will not be this formulaic. Overall records, conf records, quad W/L analysis will also get consideration. But the metrics somewhat even out that which is inherently uneven. And while we have 2 weeks to go, some of these metrics are probably becoming close to set in concrete.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

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What was so consequential about it?

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Until 1989, the game had been always been played at a neutral site. This made sense up through the 70’s, as Bham’s Legion Field was (1) significantly larger than either program’s home stadium and (2) was regularly the site of both team’s biggest home games. Auburn had weaned itself off BHM games in the 70s after it expanded Jordan-Hare Stadium on Auburn’s campus, and following a second expansion in 1987, was one of the largest on-campus stadiums in the country. Alabama, however, continued to play multiple home games every season at Legion Field, including all of its big games. (At the time, Bryant-Denny remained a quaint 60K seat bowl.). While the “Iron Bowl” remained, by contract, at Legion Field through the ‘88 season, the alleged 50/50 split in tickets had long since been a fiction, as the City of BHM received a large allotment and BHM was, and remains, Bammer-Ham.

Approaching the ‘89 season and the end of the Legion Field contract, Auburn told Alabama it was moving its home games in the future on campus to Jordan Hare. Alabama told Auburn it would never agree to that arrangement. Auburn called their bluff, said we’ll see you in Auburn on 12/2/89, and the bammer admin had no choice but to capitulate and agree that Auburn could play its home games wherever it pleased. (The settlement of a threatened lawsuit by the City of BHM resulted in one final AU home game, in ‘91, being played at Legion Field.)

At some point, Alabama would have realized that the permanent “neutral site” game was also not in its long term interest. But the ‘89 game — which was far and away the most electric atmosphere folks of my generation have ever witnessed for any Auburn game — forced Alabama to also eventually leave playing any home games in BHM and begin its investment in BDS.

Oh, and Auburn won the game, secured its 3d straight share of an SEC title, and won its 4th straight game over Alabama — again, something people of my generation would have never considered possible a mere decade earlier, when AU was suffering through a 9-game losing streak at the end of the Bryant era.

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aTm and Ole Miss finishing with freakin gauntlets.

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Auburn finishes vs OU (actually ranked, not sure why NR in OP), @aTm, @MSU, vs UGA.

It’s Tenner for me, too. My fellow Aub grad younger sister married a UTn grad, and he’s a good dude. (Raised two daughters that went to Auburn, and he’s always genuinely enjoyed his visits to the Plain for games, etc.).

Plus the whole enemy-of-my-enemy thing.

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Damn, some of you are enjoying the HELL out of this.

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The karmic value of their current circumstance cannot be understated.

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1) Alabama - 11 2) Arkansas - 10 3) Tennessee - 9

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If you go back 1 more tourney (2018), it changes a lot at the top:

1) Aub, Ala, Tenn -11

4) Arky - 10
5) Gata – 8
6) Kats – 6

7)UTx – 5
8) LSU 3
9) OM, OU, aTm – 2
12) Mizzou - 1

13 -16 – No change (0)