Never understood why UK has never been more consistently competitive in football.
SEC money - check
SEC caliber fanbase - check
Big stadium - check
Im not saying they have to be Bama, but Mizzou has been to the SECCG twice recently, South Carolina has been there a bunch of times recently, no reason UK cant float around in the 8-10 win territory consistently and maybe when Saban is finished, occasionally win the SEC.
I don't think anyone really responded to this. What you say is definitely true, but it wasn't until the Stoops era that UK truly took football as serious as they needed to take it.
When you're in the SEC you can't be rolling out mid major type players and think you're going to win. It's taken Mark Stoops several years to fix the lack of recruiting and the lack of good program management that spanned many decades.
When you look at UK now, they have legit SEC players on the field and can finally compete. But it took a yeoman's effort by Stoops to get it to where it is now.
As far as programs like Mizzou getting to the SEC championship game, I haven't looked, but I'll bet the unbalanced schedule played into their favor. Georgia and Florida weren't juggernauts at that time and the rest of the SEC east was mediocre by SEC standards.
I'll bet Mizzou got one or both of Florida and UGA at home or one of them lost a couple games they shouldn't have.
But, like UK this year, they probably didn't have to play Bama, Auburn AND LSU. Heck, they may only have played one of those three.
Also, I'll have to check, I don't think South Carolina has been to any recent SECC games. They were decent here and there, but never anything special. Maybe they got there one time a few years ago when they had Clowney on there squad. But they certainly haven't been there a bunch of times.
But it appears to me that UK has truly taken football seriously now, however, they are still way behind the true powers in the SEC. Trying to compete with UGA, Bama, LSU, Auburn, Florida, UT and both Mississippi schools is not an easy task.
