I'm not a fan of the permanent rival. It doesn't create much in the way of a rivalry, and I'd like to see more regular games against Tennessee, Georgia and USCe.
Why was LSU named UF's permanent rival back during expansion. I know the rivalries were all about keeping the UGA-Auburn and UT-Bama games going but why UF? I understand why Ark-USC would be paired also as the two new members.
Since '45, Ole Piss play Vandy every year except '68 and '69, so I guess they wanted to keep that one going. We've played UF every year since '53, our longest running series from the East.
This is obviously just my opinion.But my belief is ,when expansion first took place the SEC wanted Bama in the championship game.The schedule had 2 permanent opponents from the opposite division and one that rotated ...Alabama's biggest competition from the west would come from Auburn and LSU. So both LSU and Auburn drew the toughest opponent from the East...FLorida ...has one of their permanent opponents..Who was Alabama's permanent opponent from the East....VANDY... It is obviously more fair now with everyone keeping their rival and everyone else rotating in and out.
Hmmm... interesting. I've never noticed that before. I've always heard that they matched up the teams based on historical evidence of the school's ability to field a good football team. But if that were the case it seems it would've been Alabama vs UGA (UF hadn't done anything yet). Perhaps the people in charge were thinking ahead & figured their program would get severely punished for cheating. That'd be the only way to explain it. :hihi:
In 1992 Spurrier had already led Florida to its first two SEC titles in 1990 and 1991.The SEC's job was to make Florida's road to the SEC championship game has difficult as possible.They gave the Gators the permanent opponents of LSU and Auburn.This was done so after the precious gumps made it to the championship game ,they wouldn't have to play Florida.Obviously ,that didn't work. Then to make the Tide's road as easy as possible while keeping the Tenn game on their schedule ,they gave the Tide ,Vandy. Historically ,LSU and Auburn have been the Tide's biggest obstacles from the teams that would become the West,so both teams draw Florida. here are the 2 permanent opponents when the SEC split into divisions in 1992. Alabama = VANDY,TENN LSU=FLA,KEN AUB=FLA,GA ARK =SC ,TENN OLE MISS=VANDY ,GA MISS ST=KEN ,SC FLA=AUB , LSU GA=OLE MISS ,AUB SC=MISS ST ,ARK TENN =ALA,ARK VANDY=ALA,OLE MISS KEN=LSU,MISS ST This did happen to work out well for bama until the SEC went to only one permanent opponent .The only problem with the whole scenario was LSU was too bad to contend with Fla ,but how was the SEC to know that LSU would be that bad for that long.
