Lol.... go look at the out of conference records and especially the bowl records during that period and get back to me.
The big 10 and big 12 may never overcome the bcs. previously they were allowed to claim national championships after beating a 3 loss team in the Rose bowl or the Orange Bowl.
I don’t disagree on the absurdity of the bowl alliance. It also burned them a few times as well. And I don’t care a bit about non-championship bowl games. They bring nothing to the table in determining matters.
But to be clear, the SEC Champ was in fact not the best team in the country ‘90, ‘91, ‘93, 94, ‘95, ‘97, ‘99, ‘00 or ‘01. All the other years are certainly up for debate though. Tough to argue that the SEC is superior when the team that ran roughshod through it annually got punched in the face by the ACC’s best squad in a meaningful rivalry game, including some real beatings like 2000. And considering we weren’t truly challenged in 1995(think Vandy played us tough, as usual) but got throttled by the B12, who also won it all or a piece in ‘94 and ‘97, I’m not discrediting the idea that they were better. Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try, though. I, for one, just enjoy being on the victorious side of debates.
There’s a reason an undefeated ‘04 Aub team was left out. As much as I love the idea that we ruined their ‘02 season there’s also a valid argument that uga was getting left out that year regardless of our upset. And there’s also a reason why UCLA’s upset was so huge in 2006. Despite each having one loss, we were in the outside looking in because USC was just considered better. Not to mention the whole OHst/Mich rematch discussion.
The reality is the perception of the Sec changed in 2006. We started this idea that the conference is just hands down better than anyone else. It wasn’t before, and again that’s just factual data.