Welcome to the jungle ...

  So I broke down and did it - created a blog.  And I am going to jump right in to the BCS mess.  No, I'm not going to suggest blowing up the BCS.  It IS better than what came before.  Just ask Frank Kush and Arizona State.

  Arizona State was the Boise State of the early 70's.  From 1969-1973 ASU went 50-6, including Winning the 1970 Peach Bowl, and the 1971, 1972 and 1973 Fiesta Bowls.   ASU ran the table again in 1975, finishing 11-0 and #2 in the country.   The conference ASU played in? The Western Athletic Conference (WAC).

  Fast Forward to today.  You have four undefeated teams from four different conferences.  Oregon, Auburn, Boise State and Texas Christian (TCU).  But how to rate them?  Have TCU and Boise played inferior opponents?  That is what I want to break down.

  For a backdrop, Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee made disparaging comments today about Boise State and TCU's schedule strength.  Well that comparison is easy - using Jeff Sagarin's ratings, Ohio State is 59th in SoS (Strength of Schedule), TCU 68, Boise 73.  Not significantly different.  But Mr Gee went on to talk about the "Meat Grinder" of AQ conferences vs non-AQ Conferences.  THAT got me thinking.

  So what I did was take the Sagarin SoS rankings per conference, divided by the number of teams in each conference, and then took that average, and made a list of what team's schedule is most like the conference average.  The results were shocking:
                  High   Low  Average  Mean  Team(s) average is most like
Pacific 10        1      19      6.6       10     Southern California (7)
Big 12             9      43     21.5      26      North Carolina, San Jose State
SEC               12     58     29.75    35      Arkansas
ACC               21     81    50.16     51      Clemson
Big Ten          28     80     51.72     54      NC State
Mtn West       35     86     59.77     60      New Mexico, Ohio State, Wisconsin
WAC             22     95     69.66     59      TCU, Air Force, Virginia
Big East         53     89     73.88      71      Boise State, Marshall

So as you can see Mr Gee has not one iota of room to talk - his own school fits the conference average - for the Mountain West, one of those conferences he is lambasting as not being worthy of the NC Game.  Something can be said for a conference's consistency when the "Team most like" is a school from that conference (Pac 10, SEC, ACC).  Whereas when the average is NOT a conference member, it suggests to me that a conference doesn't have consistency.  Also, the toughest schedule in a conference is never the conference leader (By overall record).  Let's look at this closer:

                    Toughest Schedule               Weakest Schedule          Leader
PAC 10    -    Washington (1)                   Oregon (19)                    Oregon
Big 12      -    Iowa State                          OK State                        OK State
SEC         -    Vanderbilt                           Kentucky                       Auburn
ACC        -     North Carolina                    Georgia Tech                 Virginia Tech
Big 10      -    Minnesota                           Northwestern                  Wisconsin, OSU
MWC      -    UNLV                                 San Diego State              TCU
WAC       -    San Jose State                      Nevada                          Boise State
Big East   -    Pittsburgh                            South Florida                  West Virginia

Note that my conference leader is really the conference member with the best overall record, as that is what we are looking at.  Also while Oregon has the weakest schedule in the Pac 10, the Ducks SoS is higher than any other conference's average, and better than all but two other conferences' toughest schedule (SEC, Big 12).  Indeed if we look at Boise State, TCU, and all FBS 1 loss teams, once again the toughest schedule comes from the Pac 10:

Stanford               8
LSU                    41
Oklahoma State    43
Ohio State            59
Wisconsin            61
Michigan State     67
TCU                   68
Boise State          73
Nevada               95

  What does all this tell me?  First, if the Big East winner belongs in the BCS, Boise State and TCU also belong.  Second, Mr Gee shouldn't throw stones when he lives in a glass house.  Third, if ANY 1 loss team should jump into the National Championship picture over an undefeated, it is Stanford.  Finally, it shows me who plays the best football - The PAC 10.

  Oh how does Colorado and Utah moving to the PAC 10 affect things for next year?  Expect Colorado's SoS to stay about the same (currently 14th, number three Big 12 behind Iowa State <9> and Texas A&M <10>).  Utah should shoot up from #66, as it will be trading away TCU, Air Force, San Diego State et all for USC, UCLA, Colorado, Arizona, Arizona State. and half of the Pac 12 North.