SEC-Big Ten rhetoric turning provincial

Big Ten and Southeastern Conference fans and reporters have become a bit provincial when it comes to their favorite conferences.

College football is a source of regional pride, clearly defined by the SEC and Big Ten these days. Why else would Southern fans chants "SEC!" at a game, even if the winning team was a rival? Likewise, expansion talk has elevated many Big Ten fans to conceit when speaking of their league's power, revenue potential and ability to crush conferences with one single expansion round.

Researching Big Ten expansion each day has delivered some interesting, even concerning, posts by semi-objective reporters/bloggers. Take these posts from The Birmingham News and Mobile Post-Register, in which the writers basically elevate SEC Commissioner Mike Slive to a Southern Mount Rushmore aside Robert E. Lee, Andy Griffith and Hank Williams Sr. At the same time they burn Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany like a Yankee Candle.

In a post on www.al.com, headlined, "Mike Slive, in his scholarly way, goes Dirty Harry on Jim Delany," Kevin Scarbinsky translated a Slive quote about the SEC maintaining elite status to read "Go ahead, Jim Delany, make my day."

Scarbinsky later writes, "It's not a coincidence that three different SEC schools - Alabama, Florida and LSU - have combined to win the last four BCS championships. ... And don't think that doesn't bother the Big Ten's bigwigs, for all their high-minded talk about their alleged academic superiority."

He wraps up his blog with "... there's no mistaking Slive's warning. He said the SEC will do what it takes to be what it is. ... Second to none."

The Mobile Press-Register's Paul Finebaum also blasts away at the Big Ten with this doozy of a lede: "Imagine for a moment you are Jim Delany.

"Once the baddest man in collegiate athletics, today you have been reduced to being Mike Slive'spersonal piñata. Your once mighty Big Ten Conference is gasping and in desperate need of round-the-clock nursing."

Wow. 

I'm all for regionalism in the expansion issue, but the Big Ten-SEC debate has become more heated than a Tea Party rally in downtown Iowa City. I've talked with Michigan and Ohio State fans who rooted for the other team in bowl games recently (well, not the last two years in Michigan's case) against the SEC in bowl games. Once upon a time, like 10 years ago, that never would have happened. It sounds like SEC fans jingle the same song with different verses as the Michigan-Ohio State fans.

There's no disputing the SEC's recent dominance in major bowl games, winning the last four BCS titles. Likewise, the Big Ten was putrid in major bowl games before pulling itself together last winter with a pair of BCS wins. SEC fans deserve to brag about their big-bowl performances. But it also should be taken with perspective.

Since 2000, the SEC leads the bowl series between the conferences 15-14. Since 1999, the Big Ten leads 16-15. The SEC has beaten the Big Ten in three of four BCS bowls since 1999. Two of those were for the BCS championship, both against Ohio State. The first one was a 41-14 shocker to Florida in early 2007. The unprepared Buckeyes were the best team that year until a 51-day layoff (as well as a relentless Florida defense) grounded them  into chopped nuts. Ohio State lucked into the 2008 title game and was beaten soundly by LSU. No fluke in either game, although I contend if the Ohio State-Florida game was played Dec. 8, 2006 instead of Jan. 8, 2007, the conclusion might have changed.

After Michigan (5-1), Iowa (3-1) owns the best Big Ten bowl record against SEC schools in that 10/11-year time frame. Iowa beat LSU, Florida and South Carolina, while its 31-24 defeat to Florida was known more for obvious officiating errors than Florida's dominance. Ohio State (0-4) left its Buckeyes in Columbus for the SEC-Big Ten match-ups.

Once the Big Ten expands, the over-the-top rhetoric will continue. If the Big Ten beats the SEC head-to-head in a BCS game this year,  fans of both conferences will claim superiority. Hopefully nobody gets tarred-and-feathered in the process.