Impressive though the past few days have been, a gentle word of caution seems in order regarding the Southeastern Conference's overwhelming postseason football success to date.
The warm glow from this 8-2 conference record heading into Alabama's game with Clemson for the national championship on Jan. 11 can change in a hurry. Just look back to last year, to Ole Miss getting crushed by TCU in the Peach Bowl; to Bama's painful loss to Ohio State in the national semifinals; to Mississippi State getting run over by Georgia Tech in the Orange Bowl.
Fame and good fortune can be fleeting. Got it? Now forget it. Or as Tennessee football coach Butch Jones would instruct: Snap and clear.
Just put those negative thoughts out of your mind and move on to this season - to, in Star Wars parlance, "The Empire Strikes Back", since the greatest football conference the world has ever known, or at least the greatest league of the past 35 years, again looks capable of going on another one of those seven-year-national-championship winning streaks.
At least as long as the Crimson Tide can take care of one their own by stopping Clemson coach and former Crimson Tider Dabo Swinney's Tigers in the CFP title game.
But win or lose that one, what's transpired thus far shows that the SEC is anything but a top-heavy league, that quality abounds throughout the conference, and certainly within the SEC West, where only Texas A&M lost its bowl among the West's seven schools.
And while Michigan flogging Florida in the Citrus Bowl was a bummer, Florida has been a flawed team ever since quarterback Will Grier was suspended at midseason for testing positive for banned substances. Moreover, once the Gators lost the SEC title game and were relegated to a non-New Year's Six bowl, it seems at least mildly possible that many of their best players were more concerned with protecting their health for the NFL combine and draft than whipping the Wolverines.
What appears at least as clear as the Waterford Crystal football that goes to the national champion is that Tennessee is more than ready to challenge for a playoff run next season.
This nuking of Northwestern on Friday afternoon wasn't like the TaxSlayer.com Bowl slaying of what appeared to be a disinterested Iowa team a year ago. The Wildcats supposedly were focused and ready. They won 10 games during the regular season, including stopping Stanford, which certainly looked like a playoff team in its Rose Bowl win over Iowa on Friday evening.
No, Tennessee basically crushed the brainy Cats from Chicago's suburbs, proving for the second year in a row that Jones and his staff know how to prepare a team for a bowl game.
Tennessee's Derek Barnett (9) wraps up Vanderbilt's Ralph Webb (7). The Vanderbilt Commodores visited the Tennessee Volunteers in SEC football action November 28, 2015.But as impressive as the Volunteers' 45-6 win was - and it's the widest margin of victory of the SEC's eight bowl wins - it's been far from the only impressive victory.
Certainly the Crimson Tide looked like national champions in their 38-0 victory over Michigan State in the Cotton Bowl. Proving it can win without Heisman Trophy winner Derrick Henry gaining 175 yards on the ground, Bama gave Clemson much to consider regarding quarterback Jake Coker when the two teams get to Phoenix next week.
Then there's that 48-20 thumping that Ole Miss put on Oklahoma State in the Sugar Bowl. Coupled with Rebels quarterback Chad Kelly chant of "One More Year" on Friday night's victory podium inside the Superdome, it's hard to imagine the Rebels not being in the hunt for Top 10 consideration a year from now.
Throw in LSU's rout of Texas Tech, Auburn's rout of Memphis and the Arkansas' Liberty Bowl triumph over Kansas State late Saturday afternoon and it would seem there could be as many as five SEC schools - Arkansas, Bama, LSU, Ole Miss and Tennessee - crowding next season's preseason Top 10.
Yet the most impressive heading into the 2016 season would appear to be the Vols, who'll potentially welcome back every offensive skill player from this season, as well as what promises to be a formidable defensive front.
"I think they're an outstanding football team," Northwestern coach Pat Fitzgerald said when he addressed the media. "I'm sure you guys are going to write great articles and put all the stress on Butch and pick them to win the SEC next year and all that."
And we might. We probably should, since Bama is supposed to be rebuilding, though every other school probably views it as reloading.
Nor will a final assessment of this SEC bowl season be complete until Alabama-Clemson is in the books. Good as the Tide have looked of late, the Tigers may have the nation's most complete quarterback in Deshaun Watson. Beyond that, Clemson dismantled a pretty fair Oklahoma offense in its 37-17 semifinal win. Bama deserves to be the favorite, but so were the Sooners.
But when your conference wins its eight bowl triumphs by an average of 26 points a game, you once more don't really have an equal. You're No. 1. By a mile.
And if graduating offensive lineman and Knoxville native Kyler Kerbyson is as good a prognosticator as he was a player this year, he believes his Vols will emerge No. 1 at the end of the 2016 season.
"They can do anything they want. They can be back in Tampa again," Kerbyson said. "The (national championship) is in Tampa. I believe in them 100 percent that they can do it. In my eyes, I don't see them losing in 2016. They're 1-0 already."
That won't be an official win for the 2016 season when Team 120 takes the field next season. But if the Vols really don't lose a game in 2016, they should have a chance at reaching Rocky Top for the first time since 1998. Now we just have to wait eight more days to find out if the Vols will be going for an SEC national championship repeat or the league's first title since 2012.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.