So, the SEC Championship game came and went, and when the dust settled, the Florida Gators of um, Florida, won the SEC Championship leaving Alabama to lick their wounds after a stellar football regular season.

An interesting thing happened as I started watching the game.  i started feel respect for the two teams playing in the game.  Respect. For Florida.  And Alabama.  “What the hell is going on?” I asked myself, when it donned on me that this is probably how fans of teams like Kentucky, Vandy, Ole Miss, et.al. are used to feeling.  A feeling of “well, our team wasn’t even close to sniffing the poo coming out of the sewer of the Georgia Dome, so congrats to the teams that did make it.”  Needless to say, it was a terrible feeling.

There they were, the Florida Gators, with their shiny coach, and shiny helmets with a shiny quarterback in a shiny offense.  It was all so… Shiny.  But who could blame them?  They’re a pretty good team.  Ever since a sloppy loss to a terrible Ole Miss team, the Gators were able to get their act together and play inspired (albiet boring ass veer-pass-single wing-option) football.

Then there was Alabama, with their even shiner coach, but no-name, blue-collar defense and devastating running game.  As much as I hate to say it, that’s the kind of team that deserves respect, and being able to do it with no big names other than their turncoat of a head coach, I was almost rooting for them to win.  Almost.

In the end, it was still a meteor game where I was secretly hoping the Georgia Dome would be swallowed in a sinkhole the size of the coaches’ combined egos.  But at the end of the day, the Gators pulled it off, and well, I guess congratulations.

This is where my team affiliation ends and conference affiliation begins, so let’s make it 3 in a row for the SEC.  Go Gato… I can’t do it.