The National Football Foundation put out some figures this week that speak to the popularity of college football. Several caught my attention related to Georgia and the SEC.

Directly from their list:

*CBS Sports averaged its highest ratings since the sport returned to the network in 1996 with the SEC on CBS. The 4.4 rating represented a 29 percent increase over last year, and the network also landed the highest rated SEC Championship ever with the battle between No. 1 Florida and No. 2 Alabama earning an 11.1 rating or an 18 percent increase above the previous year's game between the same two teams.

*ESPN averaged 2.1 million households, 2.87 million viewers and a 2.2 rating per game this season, making it the most-viewed season for the outlet since 1994 and the highest-rated since 1999.

*The Southeastern Conference led all leagues in attendance, at 76,288 a game.

*The 2009 AdvoCare V100 Independence Bowl (Georgia 44, Texas A&M 20) gave ESPN2 its highest- rated and most-viewed bowl game ever, averaging 2,334,000 households; 3,276,000 viewers; and a 2.4 rating.

*On the flip side, the Capital One Bowl had better ratings for Penn State-LSU than Georgia-Michigan State the previous year. The Capital One Bowl (Penn State 19, LSU 17) produced an 8 percent pop from last year.

Some other numbers where Georgia and the SEC showed up:

*Alabama (57 bowl appearances), Texas (49), Tennessee (48), Southern California (48), and Nebraska (46) remain the Top Five all-time for bowl appearances with Georgia just behind with 45 postseason visits.

*National leaders in current consecutive bowl games are Florida State 28, Florida 19, Virginia Tech 17, Georgia 13, Georgia Tech 13, Texas 12, Boston College 11, and Oklahoma 11. Nebraska still holds the all-time record with 35 straight trips, which occurred from 1969- 2003.

*Conference records in the 52 BCS bowls from the 1998-2009 seasons are SEC 13-5 (.722), Pac-10 9-5 (.643), WAC 2-1 (.667, both wins by Boise State), Big East 6-6 (.500), Big Ten 10-11 (.476), Big 12 7-10 (.412), ACC 2-10 (.167), and Independents (Notre Dame) 0-3 (.000).

*The SEC claimed a record fourth-straight BCS title.

* Conference breakdown of BCS title game appearances from 1998-2009 has been Big 12 (7); SEC (6), ACC (3), Big East (3), Pac-10 (3), Big Ten (2).