Greg Sankey on SEC dominance: 'We want to be an everything league'

The SEC has been dominant in football and basketball as of late, as usual right? Commissioner Greg Sankey wants more though.

Yes, football has its arguments, don’t worry. But the SEC just landed 14 teams in the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament and more spots are following suit.

Baseball and softball basically run through the SEC, per Sankey. Not only that, gymnastics has been an SEC-laden sport. SEC everywhere, all the time.

“We want to be an everything league,” Sankey said on The Pat McAfee Show. “I think we’ve got one, two and three in gymnastics nationally right now. Baseball, one in softball. You know, I haven’t checked the golf and tennis rankings, but we got to be close. There was a point a couple weeks ago where we had 14 teams, or 14 sports in competition, and we had the number one ranked team in 12 of those sports. That’s what we want to be. We go through this change, we talk a lot about opportunities across the board, we want to be great in everything, and I think we can do that.

“Now, we’re going to go through change as we deal with name, image and likeness payments and this revenue sharing stuff out of a legal settlement if it’s approved, but that doesn’t change. our aspirations.”

While the SEC’s decision to expand the conference from 14 to 16 teams certainly helped them break the record of most teams in the NCAA basketball tournament, it only brought them even with the Big East on total number of members. However, both expansion teams — Oklahoma and Texas — made the field.

Many factors play into the SEC’s ability to make college basketball history. The expansion of the conference, a new era of athletics, and a record-setting year from the sport’s best conference all set the tone for what felt inevitable over recent months.

The SEC is so impactful in college athletics, along with the BIg TEn, Sankey and crew have been labeled as villains. For his part, the SEC’s headman outright dismissed that “villain” narrative as a clear mischaracterization of their intentions during a recent Q&A with The Post and Courier.

“Tony and I’ve talked about that. First of all, I’m accountable for what I say. And my first response is, there are a lot of people who write about what they think I think. And they try to interpret what I say, but they’ve never called me and asked or had a conversation. That’s on them, not on me. And if it serves their purpose to paint someone as a villain, that’s a decision they made,” Sankey told The Post and Courier.

“I think I represent our conference well. I can go back though and point to things now and in the past where I do understand the big picture and I’m trying to balance the challenges that we have as a league, the challenges that we have at the highest competitive end, with the responsibility for leading in a significant role across college athletics. I hope others accept that responsibility.”