Over the last week, a top-10 Kentucky lost to an unranked South Carolina team on the road. Meanwhile, a top-10 Auburn fell to two unranked SEC teams on the road. According to Vegas, Auburn was 3.5 underdogs to Alabama but favored by 2.5 against Mississippi State. This same Alabama team was coming off a road blowout loss to Tennesee. Kentucky, however, was favored by 4.5 points at South Carolina. In a year where conference play has already seen top-10 teams drop like flies, the SEC may have the biggest home-court advantage in college basketball.
SEC Home Court Advantages Are Legit
Home teams went 6-0 in the SEC during this week’s mid-week slate. As previously mentioned, this included two top-10 teams. Auburn’s loss to Alabama ended their run as the last undefeated SEC team. While winning on the road has never been easy, top-ranked teams are struggling more this season than they have the last few years. AP’s top 10 teams on the road currently hold a .417 winning percentage. Last year, teams were at .598 and .612 the year before that.
Winning on the road is HARD. pic.twitter.com/12tmDazVbv
— Kory (@koryhBBN) January 25, 2024
While every conference is struggling, as no Power Six team is currently undefeated on the road, the SEC is seeing a drastic drop from last season. Last year, Alabama had the least amount of road losses in the SEC, with three. Behind them, both Texas A&M and Kentucky had four. Every SEC team already has at least two losses. Even the top teams that win on the road get a really good test. On Saturday, Kentucky and Tennessee were losing at halftime to Arkansas and Vanderbilt. These are two teams that won’t even sniff the bubble in March. While both rallied for wins, if you aren’t ready to go on the road, you can dig a hole you can’t get out of.
While losses are never good, this is good for the conference. Take a decade ago, the 2013-14 season. Florida went 10-2 on the road, Kentucky went 5-5, and everyone else went under .500. The lack of depth in the league made a January road loss look much worse on a resume. Due to this lack of parity, the conference only got three tournament teams. The previous year only saw one SEC team have a road record above .500 (Florida at 7-6). Just one team sat at .500 (Ole Miss at 6-6), and the conference, yet again, only got three teams in the tournament.
For reference on how bad that lack of parity can be for a conference, last season, the SEC had three teams with road records above .500, with one team at .500. The SEC had eight teams in the tournament that year. The depth made a conference loss on the road look less bad to the committee.
The Last Word
Just having one team run through the conference regardless of location, as John Calipari and Billy Donovan did at their schools from 2009-2015, is not only a bad look for the SEC but also shows the conference’s lack of depth. This parity of teams defending their home courts makes a conference legit.
