By: Kipp Branch

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Before the season started, all you heard is how dominant the SEC West was and that division carried the entire conference on its shoulders, while the SEC East was the weaker of the two.

Let me let you in on a little secret going into the final weekend of the season, the SEC East holds an 8-5 edge on the SEC West going into this weekend’s matchup with Arkansas and Missouri. If Missouri wins as expected then the east will win the crossover game series 9-5 in 2018. How can that be?

Is there a power shift occurring in the SEC? Let’s take a look at the state of the SEC East going into the last week of the season.

Georgia: Right now, UGA is king of the east and defending SEC Champions and most of their current roster is underclassmen.

The future is bright in Athens with Kirby Smart bringing five star athlete after five star athlete. Smart is building a monster in Athens and look for the Dawgs to be national power for some time to come.

Florida: The Gators under Dan Mullen have a chance to win 10 games in a season most experts wrote them off.

Mullen is a quality coach and the Gators are a QB away from being dangerous.

Florida may be the most fertile recruiting ground in the United States, and with both Miami and FSU struggling it could mean the Gators get all the way back really quickly.

Florida had a signature win at home this season against LSU, and a potential dream matchup with UCF in the Fiesta Bowl could shut up the smack talk coming out of Orlando once and for all.

Kentucky: The Wildcats are 8-3 and also have a chance to get their first ten win season since 1977. Yes, I said 1977.

Mark Stoops will be on top of many SEC coach of the year ballots. The Cats played UGA for the SEC East Championship on November 3^rd, 2018. Kentucky football is ascending and Lexington will not be a fun road trip in the near future.

South Carolina: The Gamecocks are going to win seven games under Will Muschamp in 2018. Carolina was a dumpster fire after Steve Spurrier bailed on the program in 2015 in the middle of the season.

Muschamp is slowly building this program from the inside out. Be patient South Carolina fans, you have never been a great football program to begin with.

Missouri: The Tigers are 7-4 with with 2-9 Arkansas left on the schedule. A win by the Tigers means that every SEC East team will have beaten an SEC West Team in 2018.

Auburn, Arkansas, Ole Miss, and Mississippi State all failed to beat and SEC East teams in 2018. Barry Odom is doing a fine job in the Show Me State, but who is going to replace Drew Lock when Lock replaces Blake Bortles in Jacksonville?

Vanderbilt: The Commodores are sitting at 5-6 and should have probably beaten Missouri, Florida, and Notre Dame in South Bend. A win over Tennessee this week and Vandy goes bowling. This team is not a cupcake anymore.

Tennessee: The Vols went 0-8 in the SEC in 2017, but beat Auburn, and Kentucky in 2018. Pruitt needs two more recruiting cycles to get this team back to being Tennessee again, and when he does look out.

The SEC East went 3-11 against the West in 2017, and looks like they will turn that into 9-5 in 2018. If Georgia beats Alabama in Atlanta then you can say the balance of power has shifted in the SEC. Tua will have a huge say about that.