More than a decade ago, the SEC started to get serious about men’s basketball.

That’s always been the case at Kentucky, and Florida won consecutive NCAA titles a couple of decades ago. Other programs had moments here and there, but the nation’s most dominant football conference usually watched others cut nets in April.

Then the league swung into action, hiring consultants, improving its non-conference scheduling, making better coaching hires … and here we are: The SEC has two teams in the Final Four for the first time since 2006, when the Gators won the first of those two straight championships.

Florida is back to playing on the final weekend, and so is Auburn. They’ll join Duke and Houston in San Antonio in Saturday’s national semifinals. This is just the second all-No. 1 seed Final Four, joining the 2008 event — also played in the Alamodome, won by Kansas.

With the Gators meeting the Tigers in the first semifinal, the SEC is guaranteed a spot in Monday’s championship game. But the league won’t know until a few minutes before the “One Shining Moment” serenade whether its years-long emphasis ultimately paid off in the biggest way possible.

As amazing as it was for the SEC to land a record 14 of its 16 teams in the 68-team field — and then to see its teams populate half of both the Elite Eight and Final Four — the conference of “it just means more” measures success in championships.

And in basketball, there hasn’t been one of those for the SEC since Kentucky in 2012.

Momentum is with the SEC now, though, as are some of the sweeping rules changes in college sports over the last few years. Name, image and likeness funding, and free transfers, have helped push the SEC into this position.

Even conference realignment worked out for the SEC. Its newcomers, Oklahoma and Texas, were part of this year’s field of 68.

Still, it’s been something of a slow ramp-up for the Southeastern Conference. There were past Final Four breakthroughs: Alabama last season, Auburn in 2019, South Carolina in 2017 and Florida in 2014. But none of those teams advanced to play on Monday night.

And there’s this: A huge SEC or Big Ten athletic budget hasn’t been required to succeed at the highest levels in men’s hoops.

It’s tougher to buy your way to the top when the competition is filled with programs that cherish basketball. Here’s the roll call of conferences that have won a title since 2013: Big East, American, ACC, Big East, ACC, Big East, ACC, Big 12, Big 12, Big East and Big East.

The SEC is guaranteed a spot in next Monday’s title game in San Antonio, but the ACC, with Duke, or the Big 12, via Houston, will have a say in this year’s championship.

There’s something else that could impede the SEC’s progress, if not this postseason: Approval of a particular House settlement is expected next Monday, in the hours leading up to the national championship game.

This is a court case that will change college sports. Starting with the 2025-26 school year, schools will directly compensate their athletes. For next year the cap is expected to be $20.5 million. Individual schools will determine how much will be distributed to each team.

Some have already laid out their plans. Texas Tech athletic director Kirby Hocutt told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal that 74% will go to football, 17-18% to men’s basketball, 2% to women’s basketball and the rest to other sports.

Georgia also has announced its plans: 75% to football, 15% to men’s basketball and 5% to women’s hoops.

How will others slice the pie? Does basketball just mean more (and command higher-percentage funding) at Kansas, Duke and North Carolina?

As schools determine their football/basketball/other-sports splits, the biggest advantage could go to the Big East and other non-football playing schools. Even if a Creighton or St. John’s comes up with half of the cap — say, around $10 million — it figures to fund basketball more than the four football-playing power conferences can afford to.

Following the money — and percentages — could indicate whether the SEC’s growing strength in men’s basketball has any staying power.