Power Shifting in College Game - An Article by Jim Gazzolo

Two weeks into the new college football season and there is good and bad news for LSU and its followers.

First the bad news.

LSU is not as good as we thought.

Now the good news. 

Neither is the rest of the SEC, especially the Western Division.

So everything remains ahead of the Tigers, and everybody else.

College football’s power is shifting quickly. No longer is the Southeastern Conference the bully it once was. 

Georgia could win a title again, but the belief that three or four teams from the league should make up the entire playoff roster appears over. The evidence has been played out early on the football fields across the land.

Alabama, LSU, Texas A&M, and Florida have all been pushed around by opponents from leagues often considered inferior. The losses were eye-opening, being physically overmatched is concerning.

And Colorado, behind Coach Prime, is the talk of the early season. 

The times sure are changing.

The seismic shift on the gridiron goes far beyond the continued movement of teams from league to league. The new flow of money seems to have evened the playing field if not changed it forever.

That’s not to say the SEC is dead, but it sure isn’t heads and shoulders above the rest. When your biggest win is Ole Miss knocking off Tulane then the rest of college football seems to have caught up with the SEC.

Add Deion Sanders and his Colorado Buffaloes making huge noise - as only Sanders can - and you see the shift is total. 

Over the course of one offseason, Sanders has turned Colorado from a one-win team nobody cared about into a must-see-TV college football reality show each and every Saturday. All the big networks are racing to Boulder to spend time with the Buffs and get in on the new show.

It has the old stuffed shirts screaming for Sanders to get off their lawn.

This also has SEC fans wondering what hit them.

Not long ago the idea of Texas and Oklahoma joining the league was greeted with laughter and jokes. No way they were ready for this conference the SEC elite believed. 

The Longhorns sure looked ready last weekend. They went to Alabama and knocked the socks off the Tide.

That came one year after the ’Horns should have beaten ‘Bama in Texas, but lost in the final seconds. 

Texas is more than ready. 

As for Oklahoma, the jury might still be out. The Sooners are in the Top 10 but haven’t had that signature win this season. 

Behind all this change is, of course, money.

The SEC used to have the best television deal, the biggest crowds, and thus the most cash. However, the business model used by the conference has been copied and improved upon by other teams and leagues. That is the great equalizer. 

The season is a long one, with more upsets and surprises to come. And, in the end, the SEC will have a seat at the table when it comes to finding a national champ.

It just won’t be alone there anymore. And as for two seats, that might be asking a bit much after this start.

That might prove to be a good thing for the game overall, just not the SEC.

Jim Gazzolo is a freelance writer who covers McNeese State and is the host of Poke Nation on CBS-Lake Charles