If you haven’t heard yet, the SEC is the best conference in all of football, ever. The teams at the bottom of the SEC are amazing compared to teams in other conferences. Vanderbilt and Arkansas should be voted as champions of other conferences at the end of the year and there should be a 14 team playoff for the national championship of the SEC Schools.

Ok, so maybe I took it a little farther than those in the media and southeast schools, but there is an assumption that this is true. Many people refer to it as the SEC Bias or e$ECpn or various other statements. I really don’t want to get into that other than to note these two things. Calling the majority of college football fans that disagree with you conspiracy theorists seems like a serious stretch, as most of the time a conspiracy theory has an epicenter, but this started all over the nation at the same time. Second, the continual acknowledging and deflecting by Chris Fowler and others is either pandering or overly defensive. If there is no bias, why are you worried but also not willing to come out and say that you aren’t biased. The continual acknowledge, deflect, divert, and back to the SEC routine does not help your point.

But that’s enough of that, I just want to cover a couple of the hot SEC is the best arguments and why they aren’t at least verifiably correct, and then attempt to prove them wrong with the little actual information available.

The SEC Won Seven Straight National Titles

So this one is the most common, most direct, and silliest of the arguments as to why the SEC is the best.

1. Two members of the SEC (one of which is about to win the SEC East for the 2nd time in three years) were not even members of the the SEC
2. Four of the current fourteen teams in the SEC won those titles (28.6%) which is not the whole SEC
3. They won the national titles by a system that was agreeably so bad we replaced it with the playoff
4. This speaks to nothing of the conference strength, but simply the ability for one good team to be in that conference

Consider this, since 2002 when ESPN created the “Bowl Challenge Cup” which asks which conference has the best record in the bowl season, the SEC has won precisely one time. That was 2014, the year their streak was ended of seven straight national titles and they went 0-2 in BCS Bowls. Now they did win 70% of their bowl games in the streak, but in the same amount of time the Big East (the conference that doesn’t exist anymore and was shunned out of the Power 5 because they weren’t “good enough”) won 69% of their bowl games. This will tell you that the SEC was not far and away more dominant than others. Also, bowl games are a very rough measure of teams capacities because of coaching changes and extended preparation time, which is the magic counter argument to why Boise State and Utah shouldn’t have been given chances at the National Championship.

That argument goes as follows, “Utah and Boise State just win games all year by playing nobody, and then have all off season to prepare and win one game”. Is it possible that the SEC Champion was doing the same thing? Boise and Utah were playing similar level competition, yet Boise State went in and knocked off Oklahoma and Utah dominated Alabama in their bowl games. That was 2006 and 2008, two of the seven. Also, in 2009 Alabama almost lost to Texas with their backup QB. Also, few of these years were without their controversy as to who should play in the title, so any one of these years could’ve been broken by a change of a few voters minds, but that’s football.

They Play the Hardest Schedule

This usually circularly references the SEC is the best argument. The idea is that if you play in the SEC, you obviously have the hardest schedule. However, if we remove the idea that the SEC is the best argument, because that’s not quantifiably correct. Let’s look at how they schedule.

The Big 12 schedules an average of one P5 OOC in addition to 9 conference games per season, meaning that they play 10 P5 games per team. The PAC12 plays 10 OOC P5 games amongst their 12 teams in addition to their 9 conference game slate, putting them at 9.8333 P5 games per team in the season. Big 10 and ACC lead the nation in number of OOC P5 games scheduled at 17 each, which averages to 9.2143 P5 games per team. Interesting to note, the ACC is the only of these four conferences to play 1 FCS team per team in the conference. Most people use this to criticize the ACC’s scheduling, but the SEC also plays 14 FCS teams. The difference is they only play 11 P5 OOC opponents (less than 1 per team) for an average of 8.7857 P5 OOC per team. On the basis of that alone, the SEC actually schedules easier schedules than any other conference.

Another look will show the OOC for the SEC that are P5 are: West Virginia, Clemson (x2), Florida State, Georgia Tech, Louisville, Kansas State, Indiana, Texas Tech, Wisconsin, Oklahoma. So not necessarily a bad schedule, I only did this to point out that four of those games are yearly rivalry games and three were big money neutral site games. Only four of these were home-home options (Clemson, Kansas State, Oklahoma, Indiana).

However, there is no way you can actually argue that the SEC is the best because they play the hardest schedule without the assumption that they are the best conference. Even SOS algorithms are flawed because they look at the records of your opponents. The problem with this is that if you play a bunch of other teams that have easy schedules it slowly starts floating all of your strengths up. As you play each other, the cycle creates the need where your conference foes OOC record is really important, so the worse the OOC schedule, the better you look. Actually, the best way to do this is to play top tier non-P5 schools to game the system. It will unduly inflate the SoS. This isn’t to say the SEC is intentionally doing that, just that SoS for the SEC is not necessarily as cut and dry as everyone tries to make it out to be.

The SEC East Doesn’t Count

This is my favorite argument. The concept here is that you can’t count how bad the SEC East is. This includes South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Vanderbilt. After this weekend though, you have to consider that, since UGA and Missouri took care of the SEC West opponents. Alabama was the only SEC West team to win this past week (by playing another SEC West team). You can’t leave out half a conference though and expect to be the best. You also can’t forget the Missouri got beat by the bottom of the barrel Big 10 team.

Parity

This argument is often used to suggest that the SEC just “beats each other up”. I think that it’s misguided. I think the P5 conferences have parity all the way around. I think that most teams in any of the P5 conferences have the talent to show up and surprise any other team, this is how an upset happens. The different is the rhetoric used when discussing it.

This was going to be my last argument but the other arguments were long so I moved them to the end. But I think people just need to realize that there is no “dominant conference” and even if there were it would be near impossible to measure. The ACC sent 11 teams to bowls last years, went 2-0 in the BCS, and won the National Title, yet gets no respect because they are the ACC.

The Big Ten continually gets next to no respect, but they also fail to show up on the biggest stage which doesn’t help them. Ohio State is really their only team that’s moderately dominant with the rest playing catch up. It doesn’t mean that the teams there are not capable of winning.

Believing there is only parity in one conference though is on e of the ways you know someone hasn’t actually seen football outside the SEC. But there are a lot of good teams, and really that’s what makes college football great, anyone can win on a given Saturday, it only matters as to who does win.

Look at the Rankings

This is one of those arguments that just doesn’t hold water. I will partake in the “SEC Bias” conspiracy theories here, but only so much as I can use constructive arguments to try and point out the problems in the rankings. This is not necessarily unique to just SEC rankings, but I think it is more apparent with it. Let’s look at the rankings from this year, and hopefully you can see that the bias of the SEC argument that they are simply the best conference because they are, inflates the rankings to prop everyone else’s argument up. I’ll use the AP for this as I generally think those voters are more informed than coaches who can not watch all the games.

It all starts with the preseason (which I hate this poll, because it sets up the season for misconceptions):

SEC Teams in Preseason Polls

Alabama (2), Auburn (6), South Carolina (9), Georgia (12), LSU (13), Ole Miss (18), Texas A&M (21), Missouri (24), Florida (27), Mississippi State (36), Vanderbilt (46)

First Place Votes: Florida State 57, Alabama 1, Oregon 1, Oklahoma 1

I notate those receiving votes to point out that 11 of the 14 teams in the SEC were receiving votes and considered to be in the top 10 by at least 2 people in the AP. The only teams not on here are Arkansas, Kentucky, and Tennessee.

Some people will argue that this is just more evidence of how great the SEC is and has nothing to do with skewed perception. To stat I will note that Stanford 11th, North Carolina 23rd, UCF 26th, Michigan 37th, and Texas Tech 38th. Oregon State, Texas Tech, Cincinnati, Boise State, BYU and Penn State were also in there receiving votes. The preseason poll is terrible for football, but it does unveil the misconceptions that people have that lead to their confirmation bias. I think as you can see below, before the first snap, everyone had made up their mind on conference strength.

Teams receiving votes in preseason top 25:
ACC: 7
BIG10: 8
BIG12: 7
PAC12: 7
SEC: 11
Non-P5: 10

SEC Teams in Week 2 Polls

Alabama (2/+0), Auburn (5/+1), Georgia (6/+5), Texas A&M (9/+12), LSU (12/+1), Ole Miss (15/+3), South Carolina (21/-12), Missouri (24/+0)

Other Receiving: Florida (29/-2), Mississippi State (31/+5), Tennessee (39/NR)

First Place Votes: Florida State 49 (-8), Alabama 1 (+0), Oregon 5 (+4), Oklahoma 2 (+1), Georgia 2 (+2), Texas A&M 2 (+2), LSU 1 (+1)

So a few things of note in how the polls favor SEC teams. First off, Tennessee climbed into the receiving votes by simply beating Utah State 38-7. All they had to do was to beat a team they should’ve beat and people thought they were in the top 25. Tennessee was the only team to move into someones poll that wasn’t their prior except North Dakota State (who someone voted for until they finally lost). But NDSU gained two votes and Tennessee gained 14. Also, Auburn moved up a spot by beating Arkansas but Ohio State moved down three spots by beating Navy. Similarly, UCLA moved down 4 spots (jumped by UGA, Mich St, Texas A&M and Baylor) by beating UVA and Stanford moved down 2 spots (jumped by A&M and LSU) for beating UC Davis. Also, South Carolina stayed in the polls even after getting throttled and A&M propelled up to #9. Also of note, UGA and Texas A&M received 2 first place votes each (to Alabama and LSU at 1 each).

Sidebar: Oregon picked up 4 first place votes by beating FCS South Dakota, so perception can be skewed to other teams as well. It just happens the SEC is an entire conference of skewed perception.

SEC Teams in the Week 3 Polls

Alabama (3/-1), Auburn(5/+0), Georgia (6/+0), Texas A&M (7/+2), LSU (10/+2), Ole Miss (14/+1), Missouri (20/+4), South Carolina (24/-3)

Other Receiving: Florida (29/+0), Mississippi St (33/-2), Tennessee (35/+4)

First Place Votes: Florida State 38 (-11), Oregon 16 (+11), Alabama 1 (+0), Oklahoma 2 (+0). Georgia 1 (-1), Texas A&M 2 (+0),

Nothing major happened here, Ohio State did fall 14 position for losing to Virginia Tech who moved up to 17. They were not afforded the same benefit of the doubt that South Carolina was when they lost. Virginia Tech also did not get the bump that A&M got either, even though they won on the road.

SEC Teams in the Week 4 Polls

Alabama (3/+0), Auburn (5/+0), Texas A&M (6/+1), LSU (8/+2), Ole Miss (10/+4), Georgia (13/-7), South Carolina (14/+10), Missouri (18/+2)

Other Receiving: Mississippi State (28/+5), Florida (34/-5), Arkansas (41, NR)

First Place Votes: Florida State 37 (-1), Oregon 17 (+1), Alabama 1 (+0), Oklahoma 2 (+0), Texas A&M 3  (+1)

A couple of interesting things happened here. Texas A&M picked up it third first place vote with a 38-10 win over Rice after blowing out FCS Lamar receiving the one Georgia lost after losing to South Carolina. Ole Miss moved up four spots by beat UL-Lafayette jumping UCLA who beat Texas (this is a head scratcher). Also, South Carolina benefits from a little bump moving up to 14th with a win over UGA and UGA only moves down to 13th, all in spite of the 52-28 loss South Carolina took and the near escape of East Carolina.

SEC Teams in the Week 5 Polls

Alabama (3/+0), Auburn (5/+0), Texas A&M (6/+0), Ole Miss (10/+0), Georgia (12/+1), South Carolina (13/+1), Mississippi State (14/+12), LSU (17/-9)

Other Receiving: Arkansas (37/+4), Missouri (39/-21)

First Place Votes: Florida State 34 (-3), Oregon 12 (-5), Alabama 6 (+5), Oklahoma 4 (+2), Texas A&M 4 (+1)

Alabama picked up five first place votes by knocking off an unknown Florida team. Texas A&M picked up one more first place vote by beating SMU and still hasn’t played a quality opponent since South Carolina. Georgia and South Carolina each move up one spot to account for LSU dropping.

The biggest thing to note, Mississippi State moved up to 14 for beating 8th ranked LSU who fell 9 spots. A few weeks prior when Virginia Tech upset Ohio State they moved into the polls at 17th and Ohio State dropped 12 spots. That’s the most direct thing you can show for at least some skewed perception. Of the 9 one loss teams in the polls, three are from the SEC.

SEC Teams in the Week 6 Polls

Alabama (3/+0), Auburn (5/+0), Texas A&M (6/+0), Ole Miss (11/-1), Mississippi State (12/+2), Georgia (13/-1), LSU (15/+2), Missouri (24/+2)

Other Receiving: South Carolina (27/-14), Arkansas (33/+4)

First Place Votes: Florida State 27 (-7), Oregon 13 (+1), Alabama 13 (+8), Oklahoma 7 (+3)

South Carolina picks up it’s second loss to Missouri (who lost to Indiana) and falls out of the polls. However, unlike when Ohio State fell when Virginia Tech lost and hurt it’s resume, Texas A&M loses it’s first place votes, but does not waver in the polls (even though it just beat Arkansas in OT, and beat Lamar, Rice, and SMU before) and Georgia only has Mississippi State jump them (who didn’t even play a game). Also at this point, Missouri (4-1) is ahead of TCU (3-0).

SEC Teams in the Week 7 Polls

Auburn (2/+3), Mississippi State (3/+9), Ole Miss (3/+8), Alabama (7/-4), Georgia (13/+0), Texas A&M (14/-8),  Missouri (23/+1)

Other Receiving: LSU (30/-15), Arkansas (33/+0), Kentucky (38/NR), South Carolina (41/-14)

First Place Votes: Florida State 35 (+8), Auburn 23 (+23), Mississippi State (+2)

This is where it starts to get crazy so I’ll try to break it down. First off, Kentucky is now receiving votes meaning that ALL 14 SEC teams received votes at some point in the first 7 weeks of the season (but no skewed perspective).

Auburn moves up to second by handling LSU 41-7. This is probably fair, but somehow LSU is still receiving a lot of votes even though they have now lost twice to Mississippi State and Auburn now (at home) with only one decent win against Wisconsin to open the season.

Mississippi State continues its ridiculous ascendancy by moving to #3 in two weeks of play from being unranked. This comes on the streak of beating LSU (who’s now unranked) and Texas A&M (who only moves to 14th). Somehow, this even qualifies them for 2 first place votes.

Ole Miss skyrockets as well moving into a tie for third place after beating Alabama. At this point Ole Miss has beat Boise State, Vanderbilt, UL-Lafayette, Memphis and Alabama. That Resume justified them jumping from 18th in the preseason to third. No other team has been given as much benefit of the doubt.

Alabama drops to 7th, the highest one loss team, and marks the first time in the season that a team that loss does not fall out of the top 10.

Georgia is sitting comfortably in 13th at this point after handling Troy, Tennessee, and Vanderbilt.

Texas A&M, coming off the loss to Mississippi State only drops only to 14th place. The only resume bump that Texas A&M has is beating South Carolina, who is somehow still receiving a vote in the polls.

SEC Teams in the Week 8 Polls

Mississippi State (1/+2), Ole Miss (3/+0), Auburn (6/-4), Alabama (7/+0), Georgia (10/+3), Texas A&M (21/-7)

Other Receiving: LSU (27/+3), Kentucky (30/+8), Arkansas (34/-1), South Carolina (40/+1)

First Place Votes: Mississippi State 45 (+43), Florida State 12 (-23), Ole Miss 3 (+3)

A little bit less this week, but Mississippi State beats Auburn and Ole Miss beats Texas A&M. ESPN begins the three ranked teams in a row narrative for Mississippi State even though LSU has fallen from the rankings. Texas A&M, even though dropping two in a row and best win being South Carolina, is still in the polls after dropping only seven spots (and the highest ranked two loss team). Arkansas continues receiving votes even after losing a second straight by a point to Alabama (trying to validate Alabama’s close call). Kentucky threatening the polls with wins over Vanderbilt and South Carolina (who at this point is 3-3). South Carolina is still receiving a vote at 3-3 with losses to A&M, Missouri and Kentucky.

Sidebar: Marshall cracks the polls for the first time.

SEC Teams in the Week 9 Polls

Mississippi State (1/+0), Ole Miss (3/+0), Alabama (4/+3), Auburn (5/+1), Georgia (9/+1), LSU (24/+2)

Other Receiving: Missouri (31/NR), Texas A&M (35/-14)

First Place Votes: Mississippi State 43 (-2), Florida State 14 (+2), Ole Miss 3 (+0)

Mississippi State, after jumping Florida State on the FSU bye, loses 2 points on FSU during their bye further cementing the SEC perception. Alabama moves up to fourth by handing Texas A&M it’s third consecutive loss, 59-0. Somehow, someone keeps voting for them to be in the top 25, even after losing three straight. LSU sneaks back into the polls with a convincing win over Kentucky (yes, Kentucky), at home. This after a 3 point win over Florida and still only two games removed from being beat 41-7.

Six SEC teams ranked and eight receiving votes are the lows for the season. The SEC performance underachieved enough to warrant that, but the narrative continues.

SEC Teams in the Week 10 Polls

Mississippi State (1/+0), Alabama (3/+1), Auburn (4/+1), Ole Miss (7/-4), Georgia (9/+0), LSU (16/+8)

Other Receiving: Missouri (31/+0)

First Place Votes: Mississippi State 46 (+3), Florida State 14 (+0)

Ole Miss is beat by LSU (same LSU that Auburn drummed and has no real quality wins, save Ole Miss now) and only drops seven spots. Ole Miss was propelled up by beating a then #14 Texas A&M and is still being counted as a quality win even though A&M is completely out of the poll. They are still ahead of Michigan State who has one loss to #5 Oregon.

All of Ole Miss’s first place votes jump to Mississippi State, keeping the votes in the SEC.

LSU scales eight spots to #15, jumping two one-loss P5 teams. This on the heels of beating Ole Miss. This is where the circular strength talk begins because #16 LSU beat #7 Ole Miss who beat #4 Auburn who beat #16 LSU.

A new low for 7 teams receiving votes from the SEC is set.

SEC Teams in the Week 11 Polls

Mississippi State (1/+0), Auburn (3/+1), Alabama (4/-1), Ole Miss (12/-5), LSU (14/+2), Georgia (17/-8)

Other Receiving: Missouri (28/+3), Florida (33/NR), Texas A&M (33/NR)

First Place Votes: Mississippi State 45 (-1), Florida State 15 (+1)

Ole Miss loses it’s second in a row, this time to Auburn and only drops 5 positions, ahead of one loss Ohio State. Three of the top four ranked two-loss teams are from the SEC. Texas A&M begins receiving votes again for the task of beating UL Monroe 21-16.

Also of note, Georgia was handled by Florida (38-20) and drops only to 17th. This is ahead of UCLA, Clemson, Utah, Arizona, Wisconsin with 2-losses each.

SEC Teams in the Week 12 Polls

Mississippi State (1/+0), Alabama (4/+0), Auburn (9/-6), Ole Miss (10/+2), Georgia (16/+1), LSU (20/-6)

Other Receiving: Texas A&M (27/+6), Missouri (28/+0)

First Place Votes: Mississippi State 48 (+3), Florida State 12 (-3)

This week sees Auburn fall 6 positions after losing to that once overrated Texas A&M team (who receives a ton of votes again). Auburn stays just ahead of Ole Miss who cracks the top ten again after beatin Presbyterian. Mississippi State also picks up three first place votes with a win of UT Martin. Georgia continues creeping up by beating Kentucky after losing to Florida.

SEC Teams in the Week 13 Polls

Alabama (2/+2), Mississippi State (4/-3), Ole Miss (8/+2), Georgia (9/+7), Auburn (16/-7), Missouri (19/+7)

Other Receiving Votes: LSU (30/-10), Texas A&M (34/-7), Arkansas (35/NR)

First Place Votes: Florida State 43 (+31), Alabama 16 (+16), Oregon (+1)

Of note here, Alabama beat Mississippi State and they only dropped to fourth save the fact that their only victory over a currently ranked team is Auburn who has fallen to 16th.

Auburn lost to Georgia and they literally just changed spots with each moving seven positions. Missouri beat a once again 0verrated Texas A&M to jump up to 19th in the polls. One of the biggest ways you can see a bias in perception is that 5-5 Arkansas is receiving votes in the AP Poll just because they beat LSU. Ole Miss and Georgia are the two highest rated 2-loss teams even though Georgia lost to two teams that are struggling to be bowl eligible.

Auburn is also the highest ranked 3-loss team, ahead of Georgia Tech, Duke, Missouri and Nebraska (all who have 2 losses).

Top to Bottom the SEC is the Best

This argument is hilarious. This is usually the one that Vanderbilt and Kentucky get overhyped for. Anyways, here is what everyone wants, a list of each conference top to bottom. The hardest part will be comparing conferences of 10/12/14 teams to each other, because it’s not fair to throw out the top or the bottom in top to bottom. So here’s the conferences, top to bottom, as according to conference record and then overall record.

[table id=1 /]

I initially broke up the smaller conferences so that the distribution is roughly the same as far as skill level, this only causes 2 gaps for the Pac12 but 4 gaps for the Big12. However, that caused some unfairness to the larger conferences (SEC included) at the mid level and smaller conferences at the bottom. So we will just take a break at 10/12 to review. Anyways, here’s the walk down, top to bottom. Points are going to be given for each ranking (1-5)

Conference Rank 1

If you compare these teams on paper, it depends on the metric you use. However, most people would agree that there are two tiers. Alabama, Oregon, and Florida State in one; TCU and Ohio State in the other. If we just compare resumes, you have to give Florida State credit for being undefeated and playing only one non-P5 school, no matter how close. Alabama is impressive with a couple of close wins, a blowout of Texas A&M and a P5 OOC win over West Virginia. Oregon’s played close as well, but has a loss to Arizona, they do own a blow out of Michigan State. Ohio State lost to ACC cellar dweller Virginia Tech by two touchdowns, at home and only notched wins against their non-P5 OOC opponents. Also a 12 point victory over Michigan State on the road compares decently to Oregon’s 19 point victory at home. TCU had a nice win over Minnesota by 23, whereas Ohio State beat them by 7. The rest of TCU’s schedule has been flashes of impressive and some close games (Oklahoma, Baylor (L), West Virginia, and Kansas). So to rank them:

1. Florida State – ACC (points so far: 5)
2. Alabama – SEC (points so far: 4)
3. TCU – XII (points so far: 3)
4. Oregon – PAC (points so far: 2)
5. Ohio State – B1G (points so far: 1)

Conference Rank 2

Georgia Tech runs that sneaky option that’s hard to prepare for and will get their true test against Georgia with one understandable loss to a disciplined Duke team and a head scratcher to North Carolina, Michigan State’s two blunders have come to quality opponents, Baylor owns the close victory over TCU, a blowout on OU, and a bad loss to West Virginia while hampered by a bad OOC schedule. Mississippi State rides it’s resume of close victories of unranked LSU and Texas A&M, and a good win over Auburn and close victories over Kentucky (padded by an onside kick returned for 7) and Arkansas. USC, another top team in a P5 conference, lost to a meddling ACC team in Boston College and only pads a resume with Arizona as a 2 point victory, it’s largest two tests remain.

1. Baylor – XII (points so far: 8)
2. Michigan State – B1G (points so far: 5)
3. Mississippi State – SEC (points so far: 7)
4. Georgia Tech – ACC (points so far: 7)
5. USC – PAC (points so far: 3)

Conference Rank 3

Duke is a disciplined team that’s entered the realm of good teams with David Cutcliffe. They don’t beat themselves and try their best to limit getting beat on shear talent as they get better. Wisconsin has one of the worst pass offense in the nation coupled with a great running back. However, if you shut that down, they can’t do anything (as shown by LSU in the 4th quarter and Northwestern). Kansas State somehow does it again under Bill Snyder and save some terrible plays against Auburn, could be a one loss team. However, the only quality teams they’ve played beat them save Oklahoma in which the ‘Cats survived by a point. UCLA struggled with Virginia (21 defensive/special teams points to win by 8) and has losses to both Utah and Oregon. A blowout of Arizona State helps and a close victory over Arizona. But a 3-point win over Colorado doesn’t help. Missouri, who controls their destiny in the SEC East, got beat by bottom team in the B1G Indiana in their only P5 OOC game and blanked by Georgia at home (34-0), without Todd Gurley. This one is tough to rank because already we are entering fatal flaws of teams, but here it goes:

1. Kansas State – XII (points so far: 13)
2. Wisconsin – B1G (points so far: 9)
3. Duke – ACC (points so far: 10)
4. UCLA – PAC (points so far: 5)
5. Missouri – SEC (points so far: 8)

Conference Rank 4

Clemson has been hampered this year in two of it’s losses by Cole Stoudt not being near as good as Deshaun Watson (and possibly a third as he started against FSU). Clemson may beat Georgia Tech if Stoudt doesn’t throw two pick sixes and Watson is available. Georgia beat Clemson in one of Stoudt’s games with a huge second half after a 21-21 half time score, but somehow lost to South Carolina (UF is more understandable with the rivalry but allowing UF to just run the ball the whole game is not). Arizona State has a great game against Notre Dame and good games against USC and Utah, but gets blown out by UCLA and loses to a bad Oregon State team. Nebraska beat an early Miami team by 10 (a team that’s now much improved, see below) and carries a respectable loss to Michigan State. The blowout by Wisconsin hurts as does a seven point win over McNesse State. Texas will probably be good, but they can’t string it together for a complete game, a close game over UCLA and another one against Oklahoma shows promise. Holding Baylor to 28 does as well, but being blanked by Kansas State and scoring seven against Baylor shows that there is still ground to be made.

1. Georgia – SEC (points so far: 13)
2. Nebraska – B1G (points so far: 13)
3. Clemson – ACC (points so far: 13)
4. Arizona State – PAC (points so far: 7)
5. Texas – XII (points so far: 14)

Conference Rank 5

Ole Miss started the year on a tear with a big win over Alabama but followed that up with late losses to LSU and Auburn. They struggled with Boise State and Memphis as well in games whose final looks much better than the box score. Arizona beat Oregon on the road as a 21 point underdog, however,  losses to UCLA and USC and close wins over UTSA, Nevada, California, and Washington call into question if that was a fluke. However, you don’t want to be close with this team at the end of a game. Minnesota is guided by a relatively easy schedule, with losses to TCU, Ohio State and Illinois it appears that they are more pretender at this level than contender, though their final two games will tell us more. Louisville is highly underrated now that they have Devante Parker back and without his injury probably much higher on this list. Oklahoma’s best win, Texas, doesn’t help it’s resume that has a close loss to TCU but a blowout to Baylor.

1. Louisville – ACC (points so far: 18)
2. Ole Miss – SEC (points so far: 17)
3. Arizona – PAC (points so far: 10)
4. Minnesota – B1G (points so far: 15)
5. Oklahoma – XII (points so far: 15)

Conference Rank 6

Auburn and Miami are on opposite trends. The Tigers started red hot beating Kansas State and crushing LSU, but have lost two straight including a 34-7 beat down by Georgia. Miami got drummed by Louisville early played two weak teams and loss to Nebraska. However, after splitting Georgia Tech and Duke games, Brad Kaaya has finally become a big time college QB playing great ball until the second half against FSU. West Virginia has played well and looked very good against Baylor, but they looked terrible against Texas and Oklahoma. Alabama opening the season was a tough start, and WVU looked good but showed obvious flaws. Utah has wins over USC and UCLA, but has a loss to Washington State and took Oregon State and Stanford to double overtime to win. Iowa is where the Big 10 begins to fall apart, with wins over middling teams and losses to Iowa State and Maryland, expect them to fall in their final two games.

1. Auburn – SEC (points so far: 22)
2. Miami – ACC (points so far: 22)
3. Utah – PAC (points so far: 13)
4. West Virginia – XII (points so far: 17)
5. Iowa – B1G (points so far: 16)

Conference Rank 7

Florida is a team that is incredibly physical but lacks a good offensive strategy and a QB to execute. Boston College is pretty close but has a win over USC to combat it’s inexplicable losses to Colorado State and Pittsburgh). Oklahoma State took a big hit with the loss of JW Walsh at the beginning of the season and has lost four straight in a tough stretch of the Big 12 that only gets tougher. Stanford has to win this week to get into a bowl (or upset UCLA) and has losses to any team they’ve played of consequence. Maryland carries a loss to West Virginia and only close wins over Iowa, Penn State, and South Florida. The blow outs by Ohio State and Michigan State doesn’t say much about their ability to compete.

1. Florida – SEC (points so far: 27)
2. Boston College – ACC (points so far: 26)
3. Oklahoma State – XII (points so far: 20)
4. Maryland – B1G (points so far: 18)
5. Stanford – PAC (points so far: 14)

Conference Rank 8

North Carolina is where the ACC’s drop off occurs, Texas A&M is a pretty bad team as well. However, Texas Tech and Michigan are much worse teams. California is a pretty good team, but doesn’t compare to the other teams here well either. Ranking from this point down will be hard as these teams will continually get worse and is more about who wouldn’t lose. North Carolina owns a terrible loss to ECU, Texas A&M escaped UL Monroe but was blown out by Alabama, and beat handedly by Ole Miss. Michigan’s best win is either Northwestern or Penn State, either way, it’s not good.

1. Texas A&M – SEC (points so far: 32)
2. California – PAC (points so far: 18)
3. North Carolina – ACC (points so far: 29)
4. Texas Tech – XII (points so far: 22)
5. Michigan – B1G (points so far: 19)

Conference Rank 9

LSU is obviously on a down year, especially after being blanked by Arkansas to give them their first SEC win under Bret Bielema. NC State has the distinction of losing to teams better then them, but there are a lot of teams better than them. None of their wins have been convincing enough to know if they could really compete. Kansas played TCU well, but otherwise has been played pretty poorly including a 41-3 loss to Duke and a loss to Texas Tech by 13. Penn State’s best win is UCF in Ireland, but has otherwise played close losses against most teams and beat Indiana and Rutgers in their other close games. Washington has lost to every ranked team in the PAC12 and Stanford, but has got no one else on their team to validate themselves. Close games against Hawaii and Eastern Washington also hurt their resume.

1. LSU – SEC (points so far: 37)
2. NC State – ACC (points so far: 33)
3. Kansas – XII (points so far: 25)
4. Penn State – B1G (poitns so far: 21)
5. Washington – PAC (points so far: 19)

Conference Rank 10

Virginia Tech has the ability to play games (shown by wins over Duke and Ohio State), South Carolina as well (Georgia), but the other teams in this bracket Washington State lost to Rutgers head to head and Iowa State has played well in a couple of games but the big loss to North Dakota State hurts them.

1. Virginia Tech – ACC (points so far: 38)
2. South Carolina – SEC (points so far: 41)
3. Rutgers – B1G (points so far: 24)
4. Washington State – PAC (points so far: 21)
5. Iowa State – XII (points so far: 26)

After ten, it’s apparent that the ACC has a drop off before the SEC, but the ACC has a lot of good teams, if not many great teams. The other conferences fall off much earlier and the PAC12 really is not what everyone tries to make it.

Conference Rank 11

No more Big 12 teams to compete with, but the teams at this level get pretty bad. Tennessee has been shocking these last two weeks including a 50-16 win over Kentucky. Pittsburgh pulled off wins over BC and VT and carried Duke to double overtime, but lost to Iowa, Virginia, and Akron. Oregon State upset Arizona State but hasn’t beat anybody else of consequence. Losses to Washington State and Stanford do not help, neither does a win over Colorado. Northwestern has two good wins, and a bunch of bad losses. They are certainly capable of playing well with the competition at times.

1. Oregon State – PAC (points so far: 26)
2. Pittsburgh – ACC (points so far: 42)
3. Tennessee – SEC (points so far: 44)
4. Northwestern – B1G (points so far: 26)

Conference Rank 12

Colorado could be the worst of the power five teams, if so, Illinois is not far behind. Kentucky’s best win is over South Carolina but will get a shot at Louisville at season end. Virginia already owns a win over Louisville.

1. Virginia – ACC (points so far: 47)
2. South Carolina – SEC (points so far: 48)
3. Illinois – B1G (points so far: 29)
4. Colorado – PAC (points so far: 28)

The ACC is mostly carried in points by it’s mid, there are certainly tiers and while the SEC has the most really good teams (no great teams this year), the ACC has teams toward the bottom that certainly can compete. However, the Big 10 and Pac12 have some really bad teams at the bottom.

Conference Rank 13

This is beginning to become academic, however, Arkansas showed something with their win over LSU that Syracuse and Purdue do not have. Syracuse has played well against most opponents, just not good. Purdue has a similar resume.

1. Arkansas – SEC (points so far: 53)
2. Purdue – B1G (points so far: 33)
3.  Syracuse – ACC (points so far: 51)

Conference Rank 14

Vanderbilt’s best win is UMass in the MAC (and also their only FBS win), Indiana has two FBS wins, Missouri and North Texas (SEC East front runner Missouri). Wake Forest has one FBS win against Army, but has played close against Louisville and Boston College.

1. Indiana – B1G (points so far: 38)
2. Wake Forest – ACC (points so far: 55)
3. Vanderbilt – SEC (points so far: 56)

Findings

Based on this, there are a lot of toss ups but top to bottom the SEC and ACC are comparable. Both are the only conferences that have teams below 7th that are at least competing with top level teams, even if they aren’t winning. This is shown by teams like Arkansas, Boston College, and Virginia contribute to the higher scores. For a conference to conference comparison see here:

ACC:
vs B1G 9-5
vs XII 8-2
vs PAC 10-2
vs SEC 7-7

B1G:
vs ACC: 5-9
vs XII: 3-7
vs PAC: 7-5
vs SEC: 3-11

XII:
vs ACC: 2-8
vs B1G: 7-3
vs PAC: 5-5
vs SEC: 2-8

PAC:
vs ACC: 2-10
vs B1G: 5-7
vs XII: 5-5
vs SEC: 2-10

SEC:
vs ACC: 7-7
vs B1G: 11-3
vs XII: 8-2
vs PAC: 10-2

I learned from this that often the lower teams in the ACC play up in OOC play, which leads to a worse OOC record and is used as a group argument. When you have BC vs USC, UVA vs UCLA, five teams vs ND, Georgia Tech vs Georgia is another often times low team vs top team, and South Carolina gets Clemson at the end where Clemson, well they “Clemson”. However, many other conferences either play down in rank when they play P5 OOC or they don’t both playing P5 OOC. The other alternative is to not play home-home and wait for ESPN to pay big bucks so you can play “neutral site” games (which are often closer to the southeast than other teams because of the fact that the locations are better, not always favoring an SEC school like the Orlando Ole Miss-FSU coming up).

There is No Bias, Or is There

ESPN has a multi-million deal with the SEC. It would be bad business to not have a bias to the SEC, but to try and deflect and divert is not flattering. ESPN is trying to remain in some journalistic integrity, but everyone can see through the SEC cover of bias. The consistent coverage (all positive) of the SEC and negative coverage elsewhere simply continues to conflate the SEC Bias and the idea of an agenda. I think there is enough here to note that the SEC gets the favorable benefit of the doubt and are consistently inflated by the resumes of teams that have fallen off of the map.