TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — It used to be the biggest rivalry game of the week, the month — maybe the entire season.In 2026, Florida and Tennessee will be complete strangers.Their once-a-year matchup that, back in the day, featured Steve Spurrier, Peyton Manning, Phillip Fulmer and snark that sometimes even outweighed the stakes — “You can’t spell Citrus without ‘U-T’” — is absent from the schedule for the first time in 37 seasons.Alabama-LSU — soon that’ll be gone, too, for the first time since 1963.The Gators and LSU — they’ll miss each other this year for the first time since 1970.Such is the price of progress in the Southeastern Conference, which has grown from 10 teams in the old days to 16 now.The league is introducing a nine-game league slate this season in an attempt to boost strength of schedule for what is now a playoff system that has a committee awarding seven at-large spots in the 12-team field.
“When you look at our schedule, no one has created the kind of weekly competition that exists in the Southeastern Conference,” commissioner Greg Sankey said.The divisions that once made Florida-Tennessee such a big deal — winner had an inside track for the East, a spot in the conference title game and maybe the national championship — are gone, another product of expansion.Under the new system, in place through 2029, each school will play three “annual” foes. Some of the SEC’s most ancient rivalries, like Alabama-Auburn, Florida-Georgia and Auburn-Georgia, were preserved.
