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| Alabama was crowned BCS National Champions |
Let's take a look back at the season that was in the SEC. In June I made predictions for the final standings in both the SEC East and the SEC West. My biggest projection success was predicting LSU to win the SEC and win the SEC West, which they did. However, I also believed that the Tigers would win the National Championship, but they did not. Alabama was able to sneak into the title game and upset the Bayou Bengals. Here were my full predicted standings:
West:
1. LSU
2. Arkansas
3. Alabama
4. Auburn
5. Mississippi State
6. Ole Miss
East:
1. South Carolina
2. Georgia
3: Tennessee
4. Florida
5. Kentucky
6. Vanderbilt
As you can see, I did pretty well with my West predictions, the only mistake was flip-flopping Arkansas and Alabama. Arkansas losing Knile Davis before the season was a huge blow, and Alabama's defense was much more dominant than I expected, which allowed the Tide to finish second in the West and win the National Championship.
The East, on the other hand, was somewhat of a disaster. Georgia ended up winning the East, and South Carolina was really hurt by losing its star running back Marcus Lattimore in the middle of the season. The rest of the standings were pretty far off. To me, Tennessee was the biggest surprise, as I had them finishing third and the Vols ultimately ended up in last place. However, a lot of that had to do with injuries to QB Tyler Bray and top wide receiver Justin Hunter.
I finished with a 89-19 record for the season. I had a terrible bowl season, only predicting four of the eight games correctly. However, my overall season record wasn't half bad. For comparison's sake, without the three non-conference games I had an 87-18 record. ESPN blogger Chris Low finished with an 89-16 record and Edward Aschoff finished with an 86-18 record. So at least I beat one of them!
A quick prediction for the 2012 SEC Championship game: LSU vs. Georgia. LSU is returning a lot of key contributors and are loaded once again. Georgia has a soft schedule that will be very advantageous for the Bulldogs to reach the SEC Championship against LSU for the second season in a row (note: I reserve the right to change my prediction prior to the season).
Overall, it was a fun season of SEC blogging and I hope that you enjoyed reading it. I have had 1,376 views since last June, averaging roughly 50-60 hits per post. I also have had 48 page views from Russia and 20 from Germany. Apparently SEC football is big over there too! That all being said, thanks to all those who read now and again. I hope I have given you some entertainment and insight throughout the course of the football season.
I'm struggling with where to go with the future direction of my blog. I don't know whether to keep doing it they way I did this season, primarily cover one team more in depth, or just add more weekly posts other than the just the SEC predictions. I would love to hear your feedback. If you don't mind, vote in the poll I created at the top of the page. Also, if you want to, leave a comment below or tweet me with your suggestions/reviews of what you thought of the blog this year and what you would like to see in the future. Thanks!
