This is nothing new.

The SEC and Big Ten represent the two poles of college football strength — one traditionally built with new-school speed and the other with old-school power.

The Alabama-Michigan showdown in the Jan. 1 Rose Bowl semifinal might be the most quintessential of these meetings.

The Crimson Tide have faced Big Ten teams three times in previous playoffs, losing to Ohio State (42-35) in 2014 before pounding Michigan State (38-0) a year later in the Cotton Bowl and then running away with a 52-24 win in the 2020 national title game over Ohio State.

Michigan took a 34-11 beating from Georgia in the Orange Bowl semifinal two years ago so there’s plenty of conference-on-conference chatter in Los Angeles this week ahead of Monday’s game.

It’s fair to say Wolverine players are sick of hearing it.

“Yeah, I do, because I mean, I really don’t buy into that little SEC bias thing,” Michigan safety Rod Moore said. “It’s just football at the end of the day. Maybe they are faster. Maybe they are not. The film shows it. We’ll see. We’ll see on Monday.”

Alabama (12-1) is the No. 4 seed facing a top-ranked, undefeated and barely-tested Michigan team. The Tide is on pace to be a Vegas underdog to a non-SEC team for the first time in 15 seasons with UM currently a 1.5-point favorite.

Yet the talk has been mostly about Michigan’s perceived inability to compete with the speed and athleticism of an SEC conference that’s produced the last four national champions.

“You know, Monday, January 1st, that’s where we do the talking, with our pads,” edge Jaylen Harrell said. That’s all we can really do, not really get into the SEC talk, stuff like that. They’re a great team. We’re a great team. Good-on-good. Let’s go battle it out.”

The issue is somewhat more personal to Michigan linebacker Michael Barrett. He’s from Valdosta, Georgia — the heart of SEC country — but not recruited by the league powers. The No. 732 prospect in 247Sports rankings for the 2018 class was a dual-threat quarterback who grew up a Florida fan.

“I hated Alabama and Georgia my whole life,” said Barrett, a dual-threat QB in high school before moving full-time to linebacker

Pride is definitely on the line for the Big Ten, he said.

“I feel like it’s a lot. Just with all the talk of SEC’s bigger, faster, stronger, just kind of that he said/she said has been going around,” Barrett said. “I feel like that pride aspect is probably big right now with all of the SEC-Big Ten going back and forth, I feel like it’s pretty big.”

Moore, the safety, would agree.

“I mean, everybody knows overall they’re a good team,” he said of Alabama. “They have good speed. I just think it’s not really a difference in something we haven’t seen. Every team has speed that’s a high-level team that we’ve played.”

The pro-Alabama hype likely has something to do with the school and conference’s success in the playoff, Harrell said.

“I feel like they’ve just been doing that because it’s ‘Bama, big stereotype,” he said. “Oh, we’re playing ‘Bama. They’ve been here, whatever, eight times or ten times already. So everyone jumps on ‘Bama when it’s time to play playoffs, you know.”

Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.