{"id":781358,"date":"2026-07-24T07:01:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T07:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/781358\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T07:01:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T07:01:13","slug":"sec-predicted-order-of-finish-dawgnation-team-picks-conference-champion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/781358\/","title":{"rendered":"SEC predicted order of finish: DawgNation team picks conference champion"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"story-text-v2\">TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 SEC Media Days have come to a close, with all 16 teams having taken the stage in Tampa. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">On Friday, the league will announce its preseason All-SEC teams, along with the predicted order of finish, as voted on by the attending media. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawgnation.com\/football\/irby-smart-owns-that-his-roster-building-strategy-scares-georgia-fans\/XWJ3X4YE3BH7JI6WNL4WRTATIE\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Ahead of that announcement<\/a>, several members of the DawgNation team have crunched the numbers to share their ballots when it comes to the order of finish. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">The media does not always get it right in this regard, as the media has only picked the eventual champion in the preseason eight times since 2000. Last season, Texas was voted as the preseason champion, only to finish tied for fifth at the end of the season. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">With quarterback Arch Manning returning for another season, Texas will likely be the media favorite once again. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawgnation.com\/football\/around-the-dawghouse\/best-player-related-intel-we-heard-about-georgia-sec-media-days\/N72ZM67EBZDHNIUX5DCTPIX64Q\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Georgia will be a strong contender<\/a> as well, as the Bulldogs have won the league the past two seasons. Georgia was voted to finish second in 2025 and first in 2024. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Quarterback Gunner Stockton returns, as do a number of contributors on the defensive side of the ball. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Concerns about the Georgia pass rush and wide receiver room may be why the Bulldogs end up coming up short of a third-consecutive SEC championship. Georgia is attempting to be the first team to accomplish that feat since Alabama did so from 2014 through 2016. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">\u201cLast year, definitely didn\u2019t end up the way we wanted it, but we came off the SEC win in the championship, but definitely didn\u2019t end up where we wanted,\u201d<a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawgnation.com\/football\/around-the-dawghouse\/gunner-stockton-looks-push-georgia-good-great-2026\/SFUJ765OERGX3NDZEOACWB5TJQ\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"> Stockton said.<\/a> \u201cBut we had a great offseason so far. We put a lot of sweat in the bucket, and we\u2019ve connected a lot, and I\u2019m excited. We\u2019ve had a great summer so far.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Below, you can find the ballots for Connor Riley, Cody Chaffins, Mike Griffith, Kaylee Mansell and Hunter DeLauder. <\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Georgia opens the 2026 season on Sept. 5 when the Bulldogs take on Tennessee State. The game is set for a 3 p.m. ET start. <\/p>\n<p>SEC predicted order of finish: DawgNation team picks conference champion<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Connor Riley<\/p>\n<p>GeorgiaLSUOklahomaTexasAlabamaTennesseeTexas A&amp;MOle MissFloridaSouth CarolinaMissouriAuburnKentuckyMississippi StateVanderbiltArkansas<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Cody Chaffins<\/p>\n<p>TexasGeorgiaTexas A&amp;MLSUOklahomaOle MissAlabamaFloridaTennesseeSouth CarolinaMissouriVanderbiltAuburnKentuckyMississippi StateArkansas<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Hunter DeLauder<\/p>\n<p>GeorgiaTexas A&amp;MTexasOle MissLSUAlabamaOklahomaFloridaTennesseeAuburnMissouriVanderbiltSouth CarolinaMississippi StateArkansasKentucky<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Kaylee Mansell<\/p>\n<p>GeorgiaTexasOklahomaOle MissLSUAlabamaTexas A&amp;MMissouriFloridaSouth CarolinaTennesseeVanderbiltAuburnMississippi StateKentuckyArkansas<\/p>\n<p class=\"story-text-v2\">Mike Griffith<\/p>\n<p>TexasGeorgiaTexas A&amp;MAlabamaLSUOle MissOklahomaTennesseeFloridaAuburnMissouriSouth CarolinaVanderbiltArkansasMississippi StateKentucky<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TAMPA, Fla. \u2014 SEC Media Days have come to a close, with all 16 teams having taken the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":781359,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[22386,5786,2234,399,681,71803,398,396,397,7702,99,1022],"class_list":["post-781358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-ajc-freelancer","tag-atlanta","tag-championship","tag-football","tag-georgia","tag-mbs","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-sec","tag-sports","tag-texas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=781358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/781359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=781358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=781358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=781358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}