You know a conference is a joke when one team can run through it unscathed for THREE straight seasons...
Spare me your "Oregon is an elite team" crap...PAC 10 is USC's preseason until they play Notre Dame or some team from a REAL power conference in a bowl game....
oh the wonderous piece of crap known as the pac 10. The only other team in that conference other than the one time national champs is da cal bears. That is my pick to knock off usc this year. They finally have the qb up to par that aaron rogers was and marshawn lynch is well a beast. Its a shame they played like such as* against tennessee i would've liked to have seen an undefeated matchup again this year. Oh yeah don't give me any sh** about the robo ducks either they suck and everyone knows it
The PAC 10 has been a bit disappointing this year. We're like the ACC and Big 12 this year- one good team and a few decent teams.
And, it's true that we've had one domianant team in USC and then there's a bit of a drop off to Cal & Oregon. Most conferences have two and maybe three top 12 teams, but we seem to have only one recently with 2 or 3 teams in the top 15-25 area.
The question is, why? One theory is that most of the elite players are going to USC heavily and then they spread out thin to UCLA, Oregon, ASU & Cal. I know Oregon has recruited poorly recently and haven't gotten enough 'blue chippers'. It also could be the southern teams build around defense and not offense and generally "defense wins football games". Or maybe the talent pool is simply larger in the south & southwest.
Interesting post. I've noticed the same thing. When Fla St and Miami played, I was amazed at how much speed there was on defense. Likewise, when LSU and Auburn played, speed on defense was incredible.
However, when I watched Oregon play OK, I didn't see as much speed on defense, on either team. Offenses seemed to move the ball at will, which is entertaining football.
Fla St ran through the ACC for like 13 straight seasons until the rest of the league caught up. Now, with their expansion, Miami, Va Tech, Boston College add competitive balance to that league.
When SEC expanded to 12 teams in 1992, they asked Florida St and Va Tech to join. They got South Carolina and Arkansas. They've had to raise their games to compete.
Perhaps if PAC 10 expanded and added either Fresno St or Boise St, that would attract more blue chippers to the entire conference...
I think the PAC 10 has enough speed on defense. But what I've felt is that the SEC teams have BOTH size & speed. Oklahoma, Miami, Florida State, Auburn... have as good of defences ad the PAC 10 has on offense. But the PAC 10 defenses are more finess and the southern schools have speed & strength. That said, I'm not convinced that one is better than the other (offense v. defense) as it still comes down to execution and not turning the ball over. I would like to see a team like Oregon play Auburn... I know they have a home & home with Georgia starting in a few years. We played MSU, but they are a lower division SEC team and that doesn't give a real good indication.
One final thought on SEC type teams. People say it's boring football, but I disagree. Field position, protecting the ball... is a game within the game and can be very interesting.
As to expanding the PAC 10, I generally don't like to see conferences over ten teams as then all the teams don't play each other every year and I feel strongly that they should to determine a true conference champion. I also hate conference championship games between two divisions within a conference. Now, if the PAC 10 did add Fresno State and Boise State, I think Boise State would be another offensive oriented team and who knows what direction Fresno State would take.
Very well-stated. I love a good ol fashioned PAC 10 shoot-out as well as an SEC 10-7 battle.
I would like to see more top tier teams play each other early on. With your points idea, the loser should still get points for playing top comp.
Auburn blitzed Wash St. USC blitzed Arkansas.
Let Arkansas play Wash St and let Auburn play USC, or UCLA play LSU or Washington play South Carolina....match up top to top, middle to middle, bottom to bottom...not bottom v. top...
I have been extremely critical of the pac 10 in recent years and for good reason, i have also been extremely critical of many other of our suposed great conferences out there also for good reason. That being said the pac 10 with all of its minuses most of the games are great to watch. I have enjoyed for years the shootouts between the teams( many of you forget my beloved hurricanes used to average over 500 yards of offense a game while giving up over 300 a game). That also being said college football is more competitive than ever with the scholarships available to all schools now that weren't always before. it doesn't have anything to do with recruiting for the pac 10 there are only so many blue chip recruits in cal, oregon, washington, arizona. for the most part i think most of the teams out there have done a pretty decent job, with obviously usc getting the golden twinkie for the best. But for the rest of them fresno state is competitive every year ask yourself how does this happen, the talent is there same for the cals oregons washingtons and whoever it comes down to coaching. Pat hill is up there in my top 20 coaches for what he has done (by the way fisher deberry is #1) but the speed of the acc, and sec on defense has nothing to do with recruiting but the athlete that is down in that part of the country. Facts are facts florida, texas, louisiana, georgia produce fast athletes. California to a certain extent but not to the effect as the south that is the difference.
