Five things Texas and Oklahoma need to know about the SEC as they join the conference ahead of the 2024 college football season.
Conference realignment has become a major talking point in college football. Teams are making moves into new conferences this season, and two of the more notable moves are Texas and Oklahoma joining the SEC. The two programs spent many of years in the Big 12 and now are joining arguably the most prestigious conference in all of college football. This is new territory for them and their fans, so here are five things to know about the SEC.
1. It Really Does Mean More
It might be viewed as a cliche from an outsider's perspective but college football really does mean more down in the South and in the SEC. Tailgating is taken to a different level, the passion fans show at games for all four quarters is relentless and rivalries hold more vitriol than perhaps anything else in this world. If you plan a fall wedding in the south, there's a good chance you will receive quite a few complaints and nos on the RSVP list because nothing should replace a college football Saturday.
When the schedule is released for every season, there are a lot of daunting venues you should hope to avoid in the SEC every year, but one in particular is LSU's Death Valley, specifically for a night game. It's considered to be one of the greatest environments in all of college football for a reason, and if your team gets slotted in for a late-night kickoff on the road at LSU, start hoping and praying.
3. Jordan-Hare Has Voodoo Magic
If you need to know anything about Auburn's Jordan-Hare, there are two programs you need to talk to: Alabama and Georgia. The Bulldogs and Crimson Tide once watched the Tigers complete one of the most incredible and wild Hail Mary passes to defeat the Bulldogs (The Prayer at Jordan-Hare), but that wasn't even the best moment of the entire season. Auburn then topped that with the kick-six against Alabama as they returned a field goal for a touchdown to defeat Alabama. Even just last season, Auburn had Georgia on the ropes all the way into the fourth quarter at home and then was a batted pass away against Alabama from pulling off two incredible upsets last season despite them losing to New Mexico State in 2023. None of it ever makes sense and the only logical explanation is there is voodoo magic in Jordan-Hare stadium, so you have been warned.
Let's put it this way, Auburn hasn't beaten Georgia in Athens since 2007, and of the three times they have beaten Georgia since then have all been at Jordan-Hare. Coincidence?
Throughout the college football season, there are usually a lot of references to Georgia fans barking at opposing fans and players not just during the games, but even just passing by on the sidewalk. They take great pride in it and they absolutely love the reactions they get from it. So don't be alarmed, that is indeed normal behavior and Texas fans can expect a lot of it when they face the Bulldogs in Austin this season.
5. SEC Football is Truly Different
This take probably sounds bias and probably is just a little bit, but there are reasons why SEC football is considered to be a different beast comapred to any other conference. The southeast pipeline of football players grow up playing football differently than any other group of people in the country. Football is what people live for and football is what people love and it shows in the players on Saturdays. There's a reason why this conference has won 13 national titles since 2006 and it's not just because of Nick Saban. The sport feels and looks different in this conference, and it's not just something fans brag about on twitter to make other conferences mad.
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For the first year with Texas and Oklahoma in the SEC in 2024, the conference adopted what is said to be a one-year-only slate with eight leagues games that was designed to maintain existing rivalries for each team.
The move ensures continued vitality for the two athletic juggernauts and better competition across all sports and renewed rivalries. Both schools put together huge gatherings to celebrate the move. In Norman, elated Sooners fans celebrated with games, basketball goals and even a mechanical bull.
Texas and Oklahoma are finally making their long-awaited conference switch to the Southeastern Conference. The move becomes official today, after 3 years in the making, for two programs that were co-founders of the Big 12 in 1996.
July 1 marks the start of the 2024-25 athletic calendar and the start of the journeys in the Southeastern Conference for the Texas Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners.
Geographically, the SEC makes sense for Texas. A potential move would also reunite Texas with rivals like Arkansas and Texas A&M. Meaningful games against those two and other top-tier competition from the SEC also would sell tickets and fill up DKR, which could offset some of those tax-related losses.
Each SEC team will play eight conference football games plus at least one required opponent from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac 12 or major independent, each team will have two open dates.. The 2024 season will be the first year the SEC will play a schedule without divisional competition since 1991.
Texas and Oklahoma not only preferred to avoid playing the new Big 12 members, they wanted to join the SEC for Year 1 of its new TV deal with ESPN. The Big 12 eyed the substantial exit fee to supplement the new six-year media rights deal it negotiated with Fox and ESPN in October 2022.
July 30, 2021: The SEC announced that the University of Oklahoma and the University of Texas will become members effective July 1, 2025, with competition to begin in all sports for the 2025-26 academic year.
"Two conclusions that we reached that governed all of it — The University of Oklahoma must be in a place to win championships in all the sports," he said. "Second is we wanted to remain among the handful of athletic departments in the country that weren't subsidized."
SEC Network (SECN) is an American multinational sports network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which operates the network, through its 80% controlling ownership interest) and Hearst Communications (which holds the remaining 20% interest).
Starting next summer, the SEC will become a 16-member conference and have eight conference games on the football schedule. With the addition of Texas and Oklahoma, the SEC will also eliminate divisions. Conference realignment in 2024 doesn't stop there.
In July 2021, after 25 seasons as members of the Big 12, Texas and rival Oklahoma accepted invitations to join the Southeastern Conference (SEC) no later than the 2025 season.
In 2012 Missouri and Texas A&M left the conference to join the Southeastern Conference and were replaced by West Virginia and Texas Christian. Despite the reduction in conference membership to 10 schools, the Big 12 decided to keep its well-known name.
The SEC will stick with an eight-game conference schedule for the 2025 season, it announced Wednesday. The 2025 conference schedule will replicate the 2024 slate, but with home and away sites flipped. The league is set to play its first season with 16 members in 2024 with the additions of Texas and Oklahoma.
With the addition of those two teams, the SEC will get rid of the East and West divisions, and instead, the top two teams in the regular-season standings will compete in the SEC Championship Game.
The SEC will continue to play eight conference games in 2025, plus one required opponent from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 or major independent, the league announced Wednesday.
The future has arrived. Oklahoma received its marching orders Wednesday for the 2024 college football season — the Sooners' first as a member of the Southeastern Conference. OU already knew its opponents and where those games would be played. The Sooners also knew two of next year's home dates — Sept.
Introduction: My name is Kerri Lueilwitz, I am a courageous, gentle, quaint, thankful, outstanding, brave, vast person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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