NCAA 2009

[katmai]

For berkie from the post i had earlier today

"even though Alabama and Florida's only victories over another top-20 team are over LSU, and LSU has no wins over another team in the top 25"

[Berkut]

And Alabama and Florida don't play each other, right? Unless they reach the title game?

[stjaba]

What about their OOC record against GOOD teams this year? Have Florida or Alabama played a single top-20 opponent OOC this year? ONE???

Alabama scheduled Virginia Tech top open the season. Not their fault the Hokies haven't lived up to expectations. Last year, they opened against Clemson, another pre-season top team who ened up sucking. Hard to be fault Alabama when other teams don't live up to expectations, especially when many of these games are scheduled years in advance. Florida has FSU scheduled every year, who historically is a top team. Last year UF had Miami scheduled, but unfortunately the U was mediocre last year. Next year UF has USF scheduled. This seems like it would be a good OOC game pre-season, but that analysis may not bear out at the end of the season. All I'm saying is that it is unfair to penalize teams when OOC opponents don't live up to expectation.

Also, you make a big deal out of the extra in-conference game that the Pac-10 has. But the Pac-10 doesnt have a championship game like the SEC does. This extra game is always going to be a good opponent. The championship game makes it that much harder to get to the BCS game.

[katmai]

And Alabama and Florida don't play each other, right? Unless they reach the title game?

I believe that to be correct, the SEC title game that is

[Valmy]

Not their fault the Hokies haven't lived up to expectations.

When have the Hokies ever lived up to expectations?  1998?

[stjaba]

Not their fault the Hokies haven't lived up to expectations.

When have the Hokies ever lived up to expectations?  1998?

Good question, but they're certainly a perrenial top 20 team.

[Berkut]

It doesn't make it harder for the conference to get someone into the BCS game though. One tough game per year is no great sacrifice, especially when you are scheduling cupcakes the rest of the year.

And that is only two teams anyway - its not like the loser of the that game is going to the Alamo Bowl, they will still get to a BCS bowl with its massive payout to the conference.

And that extra conference game IS a big deal. Such a big deal that I bet it doesn't last - the way the system is setup right now, it is just too harmful to the conference. The Pac-10 will likely go the way of the other conferences, and forgo it in favor of another game against some cupcake, so the conference can get more teams into more BCS bowl games.

[Eddie Teach]

Alabama played Virginia Tech. Florida will play Florida St. as they do every year.

And there's your 9th conference game for a lot of SEC teams- Georgia always plays Tech, Florida plays Florida St, South Carolina plays Clemson, Kentucky plays Louisville. Probably one of the main reasons they play only 8 conference games.

And the Pac-10 isn't immune from scheduling patsies either. Boise St. may be decent, but that doesn't mean the rest of the WAC aren't basically pushovers. As I mentioned before, the Pac 10 is 6-5 against BCS schools, that means they've only played 11 of 29 non-conference games against those teams.

Ultimately though, just having the hardest schedule isn't enough- you also have to win the games.

[dps]

Well, the problem wasn't that Callahan's West Coast offense couldn't work in the Big Twelve, as was often claimed.  The problem was that Callahan's defense got to the point it couldn't stop anybody's offense.

It was not a question of X's and O's really.  Nebraska had a way of doing things and a certain philosophy about their program he abandoned.  Even if Nebraska ends up going to a pro-style offense of some sort they really needed a Nebraska guy to run that program.

That stuff's over-rated.  Look at Alabama--for years after Bear Bryant retired, they tried to hire the best "Alabama man" they could find, and while they had some good teams during that time, they were never as consistantly good as they were under Bryant.  They're back on top now because they quit looking for an Alabama guy, and just went out and hire the guy they thought was the best coach available.

[CountDeMoney]

I will still require Berkut to meet me at dawn on the green with pistols for his ignoble, craven and downright insulting statement that Florida and Alabama would be 1- if not 2-loss teams in the PAC-10.

Bring seconds.  I select StJaBa.

[CountDeMoney]

That stuff's over-rated.  Look at Alabama--for years after Bear Bryant retired, they tried to hire the best "Alabama man" they could find, and while they had some good teams during that time, they were never as consistantly good as they were under Bryant.  They're back on top now because they quit looking for an Alabama guy, and just went out and hire the guy they thought was the best coach available.

Gene Stallings was fine, until the alumni association ran him out of town.
Remember who pays the bills, man. 
Please see: Willingham, Ty
Please see: Weiss, Charlie

[stjaba]

It doesn't make it harder for the conference to get someone into the BCS game though. One tough game per year is no great sacrifice, especially when you are scheduling cupcakes the rest of the year.

The Pac-10 typically has several cupcakes, so it's only fair that the SEC gets to schedule OOC cupcakes.  And honestly, IMO, Pac-10 OOC scheduling isn't very impressive anyways.

For example, Arizona's OOC opponents next year: Citadel, at Toledo, and Iowa. The only "good" team there is Iowa, and honestly they're not even that good. Blah blah I know they're ranked well right now, but they've been lucky and are way over-rated this year, and have been generally mediocre the past few years. Citadel and Toledo are both auto-victories. Compare that to Florida, which  has USF, @FSU, Miami(OH), and App State. Miami and App State are both auto victories(unless we play like Michigan circa 2007). USF has pulled off several upsets on the road in recent years, and FSU is bound to get better with all of its talent, plus they will be at home. I'd definitely prefer Arizona's OOC schedule to Florida's.

I'll admit the average SEC OOC schedule compared to the average PAC-10 OOC schedule is easier, but not by a significant margin. And on average, the SEC in-conference schedule year in and year out will be harder. This year may be an outlier, but typically the SEC will be harder than the Pac-10 and will have more ranked teams. Let's face it, in recent years the Pac-10 has been mediocre outside of USC, especially at the middle and bottom. And the main reason why the Pac-10 is open this year is that USC is having a down year, unlike previous seasons. Usually, it isn't very close. In the SEC, the competition will almost always be close.
-----

For reference, 2010 OOC schedules:

Alabama: San Jose St, Penn St, @Duke, Georgia St
Arkansas: Texas A&M, ?, ?, ?
Auburn: Arkansas State, Clemson, UT-Chat, Monroe
LSU: @Tulane, West Virginia, McNeese, Southern Miss
MSU: Memphis, UAB, @Houston, ?
Ole Miss: Jacksonville, @Tulane, Fresno State, UL-Laf
UF: Miami(OH), USF, AppSt, @FSU
UGA: Ul-Laf, @Colo, Idaho State, Georgia Tech
UK:@Lousville, Akron, WKen, CharSo
USC: Furman, Southern Miss, Troy, Clemson
UT: Akron, Oregon, UAB, @Memphis
Vandy: Northwestern, @UConn, @Emich, Wake

Pac-10's OOC schedule:
Arizona: @Toledo, Citadel, Iowa
Arizona State: Portland,  @Wisconsin, ?
Cal: LATech, Colorado, ?
Oregon:NMexico, @UTenn, Portland
Oregon State: Louisville, @BoiseSt , ?
Stanford: WakeF, @NDame , ?
UCLA: @KState, Houston, @Texas
USC: @Hawaii, Virginia, @Minn, Notre Dame
UW: @BYU, Syracuse, Nebraska
WSU: @SMU, ?, ?

The only Pac-10 schedule that really impresses is UCLA. Several teams(Arizona, Cal, Oregon, USC) have multiple cupcakes. And I'll bet Arizona State adds a cupcake to its open spot.  Nothing to really brag about. Getting to play Washington State every year is the equivalent of the extra cupcake the SEC teams get.

[Berkut]

And playing Vanderbilt doesn't balance that?

Of course, WSU won the Pac-10 less than a decade ago.

The Pac-10's strength is that they are strong top to bottom - whipping out WSU in their worst season....well, ever, actually proves my point.

Arizona does have a pretty favorable OOC schedule next year. Be nice for a change, in fact. But the Pac-10 as a whole will play their normally tought OOC schedule, like they do every year, and the SEC will, as usual, load up largely with cupcakes, and like every non-Pac10 conference will even dodge a home game to load up yet another cupcake. And who can blame them? It is the smart move. Play as weak a schedule as you can, get that "undefeated" moniker, and PROFIT!

The system sucks, quite honestly.

[stjaba]

And playing Vanderbilt doesn't balance that?

Vandy made a bowl last year. And they would go to more bowls more often if they didn't play in the SEC. And not every team gets to play Vandy every year- only the East does. Another factor is that all the good SEC teams usually don't get to play all the mediocre SEC teams every year. Why? Becase of the way the SEC schedule works. Every team plays every other team in the division, plus the same one team in the West every year, and then the other 2 games rotate. The historically good east and west teams always play each other- Tennessee-Alabama, Auburn-Georgia, Florida-LSU.  That means, in any given year, on average UF's SEC schedule will usually only have a couple auto-victories. Unlike, say USC, which in this decade, had maybe 1 or 2 decent in-conference opponents the whole year.

And I don't see you could possibly characterize next year's Pac-10 OOC schedule as tough. 

As for the Pac-10 being strong top to bottom, why is that one team has completely dominated the conference this decade? That suggests imbalance. The last year USC didn't at least win a share of the conference title was 2001.

[Eddie Teach]

Why is that? It would make a lot more sense to just play every team in the other division once every two years.