With college football’s spring practice and basketball’s postseason around the corner, Athlon Sports decided this would be a good time to evaluate each school’s coaching tandem.

The opening of three key SEC jobs this season -- Arkansas, Auburn and Tennessee -- sparked debate within the Athlon office, and, it seems, through rabid SEC fans.

Which job is the most desirable?

It’s a loaded question, for sure. Tradition, resources, commitment, recruiting base, competition level and other perks and challenges all come into play.

Two years ago, we ranked every coaching job in the country in our preseason annual. Much has changed since then, not least of which conference affiliations.

Alabama may be reveling in its second consecutive national championship, but college football fans everywhere else are turning their attention to recruiting and spring practice.

Those are just appetizers to the date everyone is really anticipating: The countdown for the 2013 season has begun. This is what you have to look forward to when the season reboots at the end of August.

All games on Saturday, Aug. 31 unless noted. Not all 2013 schedules are complete, so the following list is of games scheduled as of Jan. 7.

What was supposed to be a ho-hum week of college football turned out to be an explosion of offense. The day began with a relatively low-scoring first quarter from Baylor and West Virginia with “only” 28 points and ended with a 133-point binge.

Quarterbacks Geno Smith and Nick Florence combined for 1,237 passing yards in the highest-scoring game in regulation in five seasons.

Are you as ready for college football to start as we are at Athlon? Our daily countdown will take us right up to kickoff on August 30. Some days our number might represent an All-America player, a great stat or just something fun about the game we all love.

Days Until College Football: 1

This week, teams around the nation moved from preseason camp mode and into game-week preparation.

We’re starting to see coaches name starting quarterbacks and settle on position battles.

Although questions are still out there before the season, some weigh more heavily than others. As the preseason winds down, we’re picking who we believe to be “pivotal players,” or in other words, key players who need to step up where their teams need them most.

Much of the discussion on great finishes in college football history tends to focus on a single play.