There's no such thing as a "light" SEC football schedule. Even if a program loads its nonconference slate with proverbial cupcakes, once league play starts, things are always a grind week in and week out.
That's true for every school, no matter preseason expectations, and it's not getting any easier. In fact, that aforementioned grind looks more like a downright slog with Texas and Oklahoma joining the fold, further increasing the profile of one of the country's premier conferences.
Those two combined for seven of the last nine Big 12 championships and represented their former conference in the College Football Playoff four times in that span. Those are big fish adding their weight to a big pond.
With the addition of the Longhorns and the Sooners comes a change in scheduling philosophy for the SEC. Divisions are a thing of the past, meaning more open matchup opportunities for the current eight-game format in conference play.
While some rivalries are seemingly preserved and others featuring Texas and Oklahoma revived, the 2024 season will bring its fair share of fresh face-offs. Even though each team faces a high degree of difficulty in a conference where at least half of the schools are feasible College Football Playoff competitors, some programs got the short end of the stick from the SEC's scheduling department.
Here's how each SEC school's respective strength of schedule stacked up, ranked from most difficult to least.
| 1 |  |
| Florida's gauntlet of a schedule is well-publicized at this point. The Gators may well have the hardest slate of the 21st century. They have to play 11 power-conference opponents, eight of which were ranked in Dennis Dodds' post-spring top 25. Florida's last five games go as follows: Georgia (in Jacksonville), at Texas, LSU, Ole Miss, and at Florida State. Yeesh. | |
| 2 |  |
| Jeff Lebby couldn't have asked for a more difficult first year as a coach. The Bulldogs open things well enough with three winnable games against Eastern Kentucky, Arizona State (though on the road) and Toledo, and they get Florida at home to open conference play. Then they have to travel to Texas and Georgia in back-to-back weeks. It doesn't get easier from there, with road trips to Tennessee and Ole Miss looming on the horizon and a home tilt against Missouri sandwiched in between for good measure. | |
| 3 |  |
| This should be quite an SEC introduction for Oklahoma. Even the Sooners' nonconference games aren't gimmes; Houston and Tulane are two under-the-radar squads with excellent coaches that could be tough outs early in the year. Oklahoma's first conference game comes at home against a quality Tennessee squad. The Sooners also have to contend with Texas (as always) and Alabama, with road trips to Ole Miss, LSU and an underrated Auburn squad. | |
| 4 |  |
| Georgia can officially beat the easy schedule allegations this year. The Bulldogs open the year in Atlanta against old rival Clemson. They also have to play three legitimate College Football Playoff contenders -- Alabama, Ole Miss and Texas -- on the road and have home games against Tennessee and Georgia Tech, the latter of which should be a lot better than most people expect. That's 10 power-conference games, for those keeping track. | |
| 5 |  |
| Shane Beamer isn't getting any favors from this schedule in what will be a pivotal year for his tenure. The Gamecocks are thrown into the fire quickly with a Week 2 away game against an always scrappy Kentucky team. Then there's LSU, Ole Miss and road games against Alabama and Oklahoma over four of the next six weeks. Oh, and don't forget about the season finale on the road against Clemson. | |
| 6 |  |
| Another difficult schedule for a coach facing some heat. An early road test against an Oklahoma State team that's expected to compete for a Big 12 title will set the tone. That's one of the harder nonconference games among SEC teams. Arkansas will have to keep its bags packed when it opens SEC play in Week 3 against a much-improved Auburn team. From there, five of the top seven teams in the preseason SEC media poll await. | |
| 7 |  |
| No rest for a Vanderbilt team that didn't win a single SEC game last season. Opening the year against Virginia Tech is a difficult task, and that road game against Georgia State may give the Commodores some difficulties; the Panthers have won three bowl games in the past four years. Conference play doesn't offer any reprieve. Vanderbilt has to play five of the top seven teams in the preseason SEC media poll. | |
| 8 |  |
| Kentucky and new quarterback Brock Vandagriff won't have much time to adjust this season. The Wildcats play their first four games at home, but two of those are against Georgia and South Carolina, and the fourth is against an Ohio team that has 20 wins over the past two years. UK also has to play on the road against Tennessee and Texas in its last four games. That's not an enviable stretch. | |
| 9 |  |
| New coach Kalen DeBoer gets a tune up against Western Kentucky and USF, two decent Group of Five teams, but things get really hot in Week 3 with a road trip to Wisconsin. Camp Randall will be rocking, even if Alabama's the heavy favorite. An early game like that should serve the Crimson Tide well when they play at Tennessee, LSU and Oklahoma later in the season. Don't think we forgot about that rare regular-season matchup with Georgia. No team has consistently had Kirby Smart's number like Alabama. | |
| 10 |  |
| LSU's schedule is a weird one. The Tigers have to play both USC and UCLA but won't step foot in the state of California for either. Their road games are manageable, outside of a trip over to College Station to play Texas A&M, and they dodge both Georgia and Texas. Still, 10 games against Power Four teams is tough to contend with. | |
| 11 |  |
| The Mike Elko era starts off with a bang at home against Notre Dame, an early favorite to make the expanded College Football Playoff. The Aggies play just three teams that are expected to finish in the top half of the SEC table, however, and two of their three road games come against programs that will likely struggle to stay above .500 (Mississippi State and South Carolina). | |
| 12 |  |
| Hugh Freeze is hoping to continue his coaching trend of improving a team's win total in Year 2, and this schedule certainly allows that possibility. The Tigers' first five games are at home, and they host Oklahoma in its first ever SEC road game. Trips to Georgia and Alabama are going to be hard, but Freeze's squad only has four true away games on the schedule. That's favorable for some serious progress. | |
| 13 |  |
| Tennessee has CFP hopes and the schedule to get there. NC State is going to give the Volunteers all they can take in Charlotte, and it doesn't get much more difficult than going to face Oklahoma in Norman to open SEC play -- especially since UT hasn't been great away from Neyland Stadium under coach Josh Heupel. But Tennessee also plays Arkansas and Vanderbilt on the road, so that balances the difficulty scales a bit. There's also the standard trappings of Alabama and Georgia. Tennessee will have to go at least 1-1 in those games to reach its goals. | |
| 14 |  |
| Texas is receiving plenty of hype as an SEC contender thanks in large part to its schedule. A road trip to Michigan is about as difficult as a nonconference game can get, and the Longhorns do host Georgia in a seismic clash that's bound to have implications well beyond the SEC's borders. But the Bulldogs and Oklahoma are the only two teams expected to finish in the top half of the conference that Texas has to play. | |
| 15 |  |
| Another CFP hopeful touting a relatively light program of games. The nonconference should be a cakewalk, and Ole Miss will host its two toughest opponents in Oklahoma and Georgia. Notably, the Rebels also avoid playing Alabama, which has been a constant thorn in their side throughout their ascension under coach Lane Kiffin. | |
| 16 |  |
| A year after Missouri's breakout 11-win season under coach Eli Drinkwitz, the Tigers return plenty of key players for a schedule that stacks up well. Four of their eight conference games come against Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Mississippi State and Arkansas, who finished a combined 5-27 in conference play last year. Mizzou also gets the benefit of playing former rival Oklahoma at home. An away game against Alabama might be the only contest in which Drinkwitz's squad won't be favored. | |
