The bad news for Florida State fans: The Seminoles are no longer the reigning national champions.The good news for Florida State fans (and fans all over the country for that matter): The mighty SEC isn't going to be either, which means two straight years without a champion from that conference.And yet the earth is still spinning!The last time the SEC didn't play in a national championship game was Jan. 4, 2006.Jameis Winston was about to turn 13, Urban Meyer was recruiting some big fullback-looking kid to play quarterback at Florida and I was about to give up the dream of my hair ever returning. It was so luxurious, people. Really. It was the kind of hair you could run your fingers through. Alas. It disappeared forever.Just like, we hope, the perception of the SEC as being this invincible juggernaut.For years, I've been arguing that the league perpetuates a shell game on voters around the country.When an SEC team loses to another SEC team, it rarely drops very far because, hey, it lost to a team from the greatest conference in the history of human civilization. And when a team beats another SEC team, well, heavens, it needs to skyrocket up the rankings because it just beat a team from the greatest conference in the history of human civilization.You can't lose!This is how Mississippi State went from unranked to No. 1 in the span of three weeks. Because it won at LSU! And beat Texas A&M! So it must be the best team in all the land, right? Makes sense.Alabama lost to Ole Miss and dropped just a few spots. Alabama also essentially beat Arkansas because of a missed extra point, needed a last-minute drive just to get to overtime with LSU and gave up 600 yards and 44 points to Auburn. And yet the Crimson Tide was the No. 1 seed in the first-ever college football playoff.But thankfully, for all of us, the 2014 bowl season came and we saw just how invincible the SEC West really was. Ole Miss got obliterated. Mississippi State lost to Georgia Tech in the Orange Bowl. LSU lost to Notre Dame (which didn't even have to run any pick plays!) and Alabama lost to Ohio State's third-string quarterback.So, yeah, maybe the SEC West wasn't all that great this year, huh?Despite what we were told for three months.I mean, think about what happened this season: The reigning national champions, in the midst of a 29-game winning streak, were passed in the rankings by Mississippi State.Missi-friggin-ssippi State!Why? Because the Bulldogs beat a couple of mediocre SEC teams.Of course, at the time we didn't know they were mediocre. Both LSU and A&M were ranked in the Top 10 when Mississippi State beat them — which tells you ALL you need to know about the perception of the SEC. Texas A&M has had like two good seasons since I've been alive. And LSU apparently stopped recruiting quarterbacks the day Jimbo Fisher left for Tallahassee.And yet, you beat these two teams in 2014, and it's like you're knighted. You become college football royalty.Right up until the point you give up 800 rushing yards to Georgia Tech.Look. All snark aside, I do believe the SEC is the best conference in the country. But it's a lot closer than we've been led to believe over the last decade. I hope this bowl season made that obvious.It was ludicrous that one-loss Alabama, which had multiple near-losses, was the No. 1 seed and got to play four hours from campus against a third-string quarterback. While no-loss Florida State was sent out to California, 2,200 miles from campus, to play the Heisman Trophy winning quarterback.What was more troublesome to me, though, was how the playoff committee's rankings were just accepted by the talking heads and the poll voters as if they made perfect sense. All it took was a couple of weeks for the committee to trump up nonsense like game control and style points for the rest of the country to fall right in line.Heck, even Danny Kanell (who trolls the SEC like it's his life's mission) had Alabama ahead of Florida State before the official playoff pairings were released. Et tu, Danny?In the end though, would it have mattered?Would the Seminoles have beaten Ohio State on New Year's Day? Well, if they turned it over five times in 17 minutes like they did against Oregon — of course not. Florida State would have lost to everyone on its schedule (not named the Citadel or Wake Forest) if it decided to play an impromptu game of hot potato like that.But that's not the point.The point is this: The SEC was once again perceived as such a superior conference that undefeated FSU was being vaulted over by the likes of Mississippi State (again, think about that, Mississippi State!) and one-loss Alabama.It's how you win seven straight national titles as a conference. Because you can lose a game — or in LSU's case in 2007, two games — and always be considered worthy of playing for the national championship over other teams with similar resumes. Or you can lose at Ole Miss and almost lose to three other mediocre teams and still be the No. 1 seed in the first-ever college football playoff.It's all about perception.It's all a part of the SEC shell game.And hopefully, after this season, we're all finally through playing it. http://www.tallahassee.com/story/sports/college/fsu/football/2015/01/12/clark-another-year-without-sec-champion-good-everyone/21657919/ It would be nice if there was a little more objectivity versus over hyped BS in CFB.
