The Grove Report's Inaugural SEC Power Rankings
It's never too early to overreact to some SEC football.
That said, we waited until after one week of games to throw out our first ever SEC power rankings at The Grove Report. In a year with so many questions and so little known from the offseason, that just seemed like the right thing to do.
Hell, we would've been so, so wrong with our first set of power rankings if we did them one week ago. Georgia probably would have been near the top. Ole Miss and Mississippi State would have been much, much lower.
So without further ado, let's get into where SEC teams stand after one week of action.
The Grove Report's Inaugural SEC Power Rankings
1. Alabama (1-0)
Nick Saban has never lost a season opener at Alabama. Taking a 28-3 lead into halftime, the Tide were never in doubt of doing that here again. Mac Jones' performance stood out in this one. The ceiling of the Alabama team will go with how well Jones had developed over this offseason. Playing in not even three quarters, he went for 249 yards and two scores while hitting on 75-percent of his throws. The defense also held a really good running back in Larry Rountree III to only 67 yards rushing.
2. Florida (1-0)
Florida needs some help on defense, but the Dan Mullen offense is as good as it's ever been. Kyle Trash showed why he's both the media and coach pick for All-SEC First Team quarterback, completing 71-percent of his throws for 416 yards and six touchdowns, four of which went to star tight end Kyle Pitts, who had 170 receiving yards of his own. The defense, which allowed over 600 yards to Ole Miss, has some holes, but this offense can score with anyone – even the third team on the list.
3. Mississippi State (1-0)
The Mike Leach air raid shocked the SEC and the defending champions on Saturday, as the K.J. Costello and the Bulldogs threw for 623 yards at Tiger Stadium against LSU. It's going to be really tough to slow down the Costello and Leach combo in 2020.
"I don't know if any individual could visualize this taking place," said Costello, who started two years at Stanford before transferring. "I wasn't visualizing sitting here breaking records. ... I'm excited about the potential that this offense has because, believe it or not, we did leave a lot on the field today."
4. Auburn (1-0)
Auburn's defense looks great. Their passing game looks quite good and the rushing game needs a lot of work. No individual ball carrier topped 34 yards on Saturday, a rushing attack led by quarterback Bo Nix. Nix also threw for 233 yards, three scores and didn't turn the ball over. It helps that Seth Williams looked like the best receiver in college football on Saturday. The Tigers' 29-13 win over No. 23 Kentucky could have looked even more impressive, as a 100-yard pick six right before halftime was negated by a targeting call.
5. Georgia (1-0)
Of the presumed top teams in the SEC going into week one, the next two were the most disappointing. Georgia's defense is still incredibly elite, still likely the best in the Southeastern Conference. What was surprisingly absent for Georgia was the offense. The Bulldogs scored just five first half points, trailing Arkansas 7-5 at the half. They turned it on with 22 points in the third quarter. Quarterback D'Wan Mathis started the game and was later replaced by a former walk-on in Stetson Bennett, who played pretty well, going for 211 yards and two scores. Weirder than the quarterback play is UGA rushing at a clip of just 2.88 yards per carry.
6. LSU (0-1)
We're going to try and give the defending champs the benefit of the doubt here. No one really saw that performance by Mississippi State coming, and LSU's best defensive back Derek Stingley Jr. missed the game while hospitalized for a non-COVID-19 related issue. We're going to need to see more from the Tigers on both sides of the ball moving forward.
7. Kentucky (0-1)
Kentucky needs to find answers on offense, and quick. The Wildcats are still opening up as 6.5 point favorites to Ole Miss at home in week two, but a lot of Saturday's game at Auburn was far from pretty. Quarterback Terry Wilson looked lost at times, throwing for 239 yards, one touchdown and one interception and he had another pick-6 get called back for targeting right before the half. The good news? Kentucky's defense held Auburn to 324 total yards and just 91 on the ground.
8. Ole Miss (0-1)
Lane Kiffin has the Ole Miss offense ready to roll. Redshirt sophomore quarterback Matt Corral, after an average season in 2019 at best, looks like a brand new man behind center. Corral completed 71-percent of his throws for 395 yards and three touchdowns on Saturday, spearheading a Rebel attack that totaled over 600 yards of offense. Elijah Moore is a stud, catching 10 balls for 227 yards. Ole Miss has some defensive issues, allowing over 600 yards to Trask and Florida, but that's also the No. 5 team in the nation they were playing.
9. Tennessee (1-0)
Volunteer fans will kill us for this, putting Tennessee below three teams with losses after a week one win, but I'm sorry for not being all that impressed. The Jarrett Guarantano offense converted just one of 12 third down attempts despite accumulating 394 yards of offense. If not for the two forced turnovers, South Carolina (who converted 6 of 15 third down attempt) wins this football game.
10. Texas A&M (1-0)
How Texas A&M was only able to hang 17 points on this Vanderbilt team is beyond me. Getting the Commodores at home and having year three with quarterback Kellen Mond and Jimbo Fisher together, you'd think this would be a great platform for a big jumping off point for the Aggies. Instead, they barely squeezed by.
"A victory is a victory, but all three phases didn't play how I thought we could or how we can," Fisher said. "But I'm going to promise you this, it's a lot easier to go fix mistakes when you win than when you lose."
11. Missouri (0-1)
It's hard to knock Eli Drinkowitz's team for a 19 point loss in his first ever game against Nick Saban and Alabama. The Tigers need to get more from Larry Rountree III moving forward, as the senior who totaled over 1,200 rushing yards a season ago is going to be the focal point of the offense. Neither quarterback Shawn Robinson or Connor Bazelak played particularly poorly, just neither did much to impress either.
12. Arkansas (0-1)
The Razorbacks actually held really tough with Georgia, taking a 7-5 lead into the half before a quarterback change picked things up for the Bulldogs. What stood out the most in the loss was how well the Arkansas defense played, especially against the run, holding UGA to a rate of just 2.88 yards per carry. They're going to need more out of Felipe Franks and Rakeem Boyd going forward on offense to have a shot to win any games.
13. South Carolina (0-1)
As mentioned with the Tennessee writeup above, the Gamecocks third down defense was really impressive in their close loss, holding Tennessee to just 1 for 12 in that department. The problem is South Carolina kept trying to pound the rock and could hardly move the ball doing so. The Gamecocks totaled only 2.5 yards per attempt on 35 rushing attempts. The passing game was okay, but you need more than 290 yards when you throw the ball 39 times.
14. Vanderbilt (0-1)
The Commodore defense actually played pretty well on Saturday against Texas A&M, holding Kellen Mond to only one touchdown and a QBR of just 32.2 while forcing three turnovers. The problem is this Vanderbilt team just can't move the football. The team totaled only 255 yards of offense in the loss, turning the ball over twice.
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