Having a class ranked 12th in the SEC is discouraging on its face , but when the SEC has 12 teams compressed into the top 19 in the nation, that tells me there's probably a lot of hair splitting between those rankings. There's a big difference between being 12th in your conference and 42nd nationally and being 12th in your conference and 19th nationally. It means the difference between the 12th ranked class in our conference and the 7th ranked class in our conference may be as slim as one guy who doesn't qualify academically, or one key player who never pans out due to injuries, etc. And the gap probably slim enough that factors like getting the players you actually need may be more important than absolute star rankings.
Don't get me wrong, I would love to see our classes ranked in the top half of the conference, but if we're pulling in top 20 talent now, that means we should expect to be competitive with just about anyone.