Sec Runs It Up On Other Leagues

Sunny weather and powerful football programs.

It’s a combination that makes the Southeastern Conference the most powerful college athletic league in the country, with nine national championships and four runner-up finishes in the academic year just ended.

“We have a saying internally in our department: If you can win the conference championship, you can win the national championship,” said LSU athletic director Joe Dean, whose school claimed three of the national titles. “That’s how good this league is.”

LSU capped off the SEC’s awesome year by winning the College World Series last weekend, rallying for a 9-8 victory over Miami on a two-out, two-run homer in the bottom of the ninth.

The Tigers also claimed national titles in women’s track and field during both the indoor and outdoor seasons, Arkansas won men’s cross country and men’s outdoor track, Kentucky men’s basketball, Tennessee women’s basketball, Florida women’s tennis and Alabama women’s gymnastics.

Not bad for a conference that sponsors 19 sports, nine fewer than the Pacific-10 (which had seven national titles) and five less than the Big Ten (five champs).

“I think the institutions have been able to make the investment financially and facility-wise that makes it possible to compete at the national level,” SEC commissioner Roy Kramer said. “This is a result of our success in the majorrevenue sports, especially football and basketball.”

Seven of the 12 schools have football stadiums with seating of more than 70,000. Tennessee’s Neyland Stadium has been expanded to a capacity of 102,485 for next season, South Carolina’s Williams-Brice Stadium will seat more than 80,250 this year and Alabama is planning an expansion to 80,000.