One Last Trip to Atlanta
Written by Jarvis Prime on November 11, 2026
The SEC Championship Game has one more night left in it. The league announced Monday that the 35th edition, Dec. 5 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, will be the final one.
The reason is the College Football Playoff. It expands to 24 teams at the end of the 2027 season, and the four big conferences are giving up their title games to make room. The ACC, Big Ten and Big 12 said the same thing on the same day. ESPN reports that Army and Navy will take over that weekend, and playoff teams will rest.
What the coaches said
Kirby Smart did not pretend to be surprised. “I think we all kind of knew, right?” he said Monday. “I think it’s a great, historic game. It’s great for the players, the programs, the fans. The location has been awesome for us. The venue is incredible. All of those things are awesome, but times are changing. As they change, you have to adapt to it.”
The man bringing Missouri to Athens on Saturday went further. “Times are changing, so you’ve got to adjust with the times,” Eli Drinkwitz told reporters Tuesday. “But my question is why are we associated with conferences anymore if we’re not playing for a conference championship?”
Drinkwitz said the sport has changed too fast and lost things along the way. “We’ve devalued some of the things that made college football so special,” he said. “Bowl games are no longer valuable.”
What it means for Georgia this year
Nothing changes in 2026. The playoff is still 12 teams this season, and there is still a game in Atlanta to play for. Georgia leads the SEC at 6-1. Alabama and Kentucky are 5-2. Texas and Tennessee are 4-2.
ESPN ran the numbers on what a 24-team field would have looked like using last season’s final ranking. Seven SEC schools would have been in it.
The music angle
Atlanta’s SEC Saturday always had a soundtrack, and for Georgia people the song was settled long ago. “Georgia on My Mind” was written in 1930 by Hoagy Carmichael and Stuart Gorrell. Ray Charles made it his in 1960 and took it to No. 1. Georgia made it the official state song in 1979.
Ray Charles was born in Albany, Georgia, on Sept. 23, 1930. So the song a stadium in Atlanta sings for the Bulldogs started, in a manner of speaking, right here.
If Georgia gets to Atlanta on Dec. 5, play it once more on the drive up. There will not be another one of these.
— The RFA Sports Desk
Sources
- ESPN: Missouri's Eli Drinkwitz questions need for conferences in 24-team CFP era
- Georgia Athletics: Smart, Players Preview Missouri (press conference transcript)
- ESPN: What would a 24-team College Football Playoff bracket look like?
- ESPN: SEC standings
- Georgia on My Mind (Wikipedia)
- Ray Charles (Wikipedia)
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