This week in Dan McDonald’s series of ranking the best basketball jobs by conference, he takes a look at how the jobs in the SEC stack up. If every job in the conference were to open up today, how would he rank them in order of the most attractive to the top candidates?
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RANKING THE JOBS: ACC | Big Ten | Big 12
2021 RANKINGS: Rivals150 | Team | Position
2022 RANKINGS: Rivals150 | Team
RIVALS RANKINGS WEEK: Five biggest movers in 2022 | Who was the toughest 2022 player to rank? | Five biggest movers in 2021 | Team rankings storylines for class of 2021 | Breaking down updated 2021 position rankings | Four new five-stars added to 2021 class | Rivals Roundtable on new 2021 Rivals150 | Should disjointed summer limit five-stars?
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1. Kentucky
I can’t imagine anyone will argue with this one. Winning tradition, fan support, resources, great facilities and the ability to recruit coast to coast because of the brand of Kentucky basketball. Not many schools get a home-court advantage with fans on the road in the majority of their conference games like Kentucky does. The one negative -- the expectation is to win the national championship every year, something UK has done just once in the last 21 years.
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2. Florida
Billy Donovan set the standard for what the Florida job can look like. National championships, Final Fours, Elite Eights, and dominance in the SEC. It’s in a state loaded with talent and Florida is one of the few schools in the SEC that can regularly attract players from outside the SEC footprint as well.
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3. Tennessee
Every coach at Tennessee seems to win. Bruce Pearl had it rocking before NCAA issues took him down. Cuonzo Martin made it to an Elite Eight. And now Rick Barnes has the Vols at the top of the SEC regularly and recruiting top five classes. There aren’t many truly passionate basketball fan bases in the SEC, but the Vols have one of them as they pack Thompson-Boling Arena even in the down years like this past season.
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4. Arkansas
Arkansas is probably the only school in the SEC outside of Kentucky where the fan base supports its basketball program more than the football program. There is a history of winning in Fayetteville that goes back to Nolan Richardson’s incredible run. It’s not in a state that pumps out as much talent as some of the other SEC states, but the ones that do come out of there tend to be pretty loyal to the Razorbacks. You can also go into Texas and get good players.
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5. LSU
Like Arkansas, players that come out of Louisiana, and there are some good ones regularly, tend to give the Tigers the first crack at winning them over. It’s also within striking distance of really good talent in Texas. The program has been to four Final Fours and gets pretty good fan support. From making calls around on this job, facilities came up as an issue. All in all, this is one of the better SEC jobs.
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6. Alabama
I’m probably higher on this job than others, but I really think it’s a very good job. The state puts out a pretty good amount of Rivals150 talent and those kids are very loyal to the Crimson Tide. You are within striking distance of metro Atlanta and a stone’s throw from good players in Florida. The brand of the football program can be tricky as it gets the “football school” label that other SEC schools also deal with, but it can also open up doors to certain prospects and makes for a great official visit weekend.
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7. Missouri
Missouri is the toughest job to rank in the SEC. It’s a bit of misfit in the league as it feels like a Big 12 job with more natural rivals there. That being said, there is some winning tradition there, fan support and great facilities. You can go any direction from campus and attract some really good players.
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8. Georgia
Georgia, along with Texas A&M, has the best in-state recruiting base in the SEC. The problem here is it’s always been really tough for the Bulldogs to consistently sign that talent as prospects from metro Atlanta aren’t as loyal to the in-state school as you see in other SEC states. Sustained success has been hard to come by, but it does feel like a job with a high ceiling.
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9. Auburn
If Missouri was the toughest one to rank, Auburn comes right behind it. The question becomes how much of Auburn’s success in recent years is because of Bruce Pearl being a great coach and recruiter, and how much of it is Auburn becoming a better job in the past decade? The truth is probably somewhere in between. The Tigers get one of the best home-court advantages in the league in one of the best arenas. In recent years, Auburn has benefitted in a big way from recruiting in Georgia. Could a new coach come in today and sustain this success? It would be fascinating to watch that play out.
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10. Texas A&M
I could copy and paste almost verbatim what I mentioned about the Georgia job. Great in-state talent and resources, but success on a consistent basis has been elusive and it’s viewed as a “football school”. So why is it two spots lower than Georgia? Recruiting in Texas is really complicated. There are multiple major metro areas and a plethora of high major programs in the state trying to take ownership of the region. Buzz Williams is the kind of coach that could tap into that talent and make this ranking look silly in a few years.
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11. South Carolina
The Gamecocks have a great arena and campus, and a fan base and administration that supports the program. Outside of the run to the Final Four a few years back, success has been elusive. It’s not in a great state for producing talent, but on the flip side, they can be tough to beat for some of the top talent that comes out of there such as Sindarius Thornwell or P.J. Dozier.
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12. Ole Miss
Ole Miss has one of the best campuses in the SEC and now one of the best arenas in the league. It’s just not in a state that pumps out a ton of talent and the closest city that does, Memphis, can be a tough place to win big recruiting battles. There just isn’t a history of winning and not a ton of fan support.
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13. Mississippi State
It shares a lot of similarities with Ole Miss except the campus and town aren’t as nice and they don’t have the new arena. The Bulldogs do have a better history of winning and signing top players, though.
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14. Vanderbilt
Nashville is a great city. The academic reputation is by far the best in the league. You have a unique home-court advantage with the bench setup. In recent years though, the athletic department has had a ton of issues and the basketball program has struggled on the court. The profile of the program just isn’t the same right now to attract top talent, and you’re already recruiting from a smaller pool with the academic restrictions.
