Football Conference Supremacy?

I was listening to a radio call-in show today and a guy called in and started talking about the PAC-10's dominance in bowl games this year.  Now, to their credit, 5-0 is impressive.  

The PAC-10 in bowl games:

Arizona beat BYU

Cal beat Miami

Oregon beat Oklahoma State

Oregon State beat Pitt (in a 3-0 barn burner, might I add)

USC beat Penn State

I won't make any statements as to the quality of the teams the PAC-10 played, but I do think it's interesting that the PAC-10 finished their bowl games the day after the SEC started theirs.  With the exception of the GMAC bowl and a few others, the "better" bowl games are typically played later.  So that right there is interesting in and of itself.

Then, the caller said that the SEC was overrated for 2 reasons.  The first was because the SEC has lost 2 bowl games thus far.  The second was because the SEC "never played tough teams outside of the conference."  

First, the bowl argument.  The SEC in bowl games this year:

South Carolina lost to Iowa

Alabama lost to Utah

LSU beat Georgia Tech

Ole Miss beat Texas Tech

Georgia beat Michigan State

Kentucky beat Eastern Carolina

Vanderbilt beat Boston College

The guy may have had a point about the bowl records, but half of the PAC-10 wasn't bowl eligible.  Half of their league made it, while 8 of the 12 SEC teams were eligible.  Stanford and Arizona both came within one game of eligibility, while Tennessee, Auburn, and Arkansas were all within one game.  Maybe that speaks for the difficulty of the SEC over the difficulty of the PAC-10, but using bowl games to determine conference supremacy isn't a great way to say who's better.  

Now, the winner of the PAC-10 and the winner of the SEC are always going to be elite teams.  Same with the Big XII and some years (but apparently not most) the Big 10+1 will be too.  The ACC and Big East...not so much.  Anyway, you have to compare more than just the best teams in the league to determine which conference is the best, which leads me to my next point.

The caller was bragging about the PAC-1o stepping out to play other BCS conference teams and how the SEC didn't do that.  That, in and of itself, was a blatant falsehood, but he also went on to say that the SEC only plays FBS teams and all that.  He, nor the hosts, made any mention of Washington and Washington State's impressive combined 2-23 record.  Conference record wise (Tennessee actually had a better conference record than Kentucky, but their overall record wasn't bowl eligible), the two worst SEC teams were 11-14 combined, and both of those teams (Mississippi State and Kentucky) won more than one conference game.  So, of course a PAC-1o team isn't going to schedule an FBS team because they play 2 teams that would probably barely even pass for FBS teams.

Finally, the caller and the hosts completely failed to mention the SEC stepping out and playing BCS conference teams.  The caller bragged about USC playing Ohio State (who sucks) and Virginia (who also sucks).  He said SEC teams only play FBS teams, or at least non-BCS teams.  The caller and the hosts completely failed to mention the following games:

Alabama beat Clemson

Georgia beat Arizona State

Georgia lost to Georgia Tech

Florida beat Florida State

Florida beat Miami

Vanderbilt lost to Duke

Vanderbilt lost to Wake Forest

Ole Miss lost to Wake Forest

Mississippi State lost to Georgia Tech

South Carolina beat North Carolina State

South Carolina lost to Clemson

Tennessee lost to UCLA

Kentucky beat Louisville

Auburn lost to West Virginia

Arkansas lost to Texas

So, the SEC played 15 games against BCS non-conference teams.  In a down year, they only won 6, with no help from LSU as they played no BCS non-conference teams

USC beat Virginia

USC beat Ohio State

USC beat Notre Dame

Oregon beat Purdue

Oregon State lost to Penn State

Cal beat Michigan State

Cal lost to Maryland

Stanford lost to Notre Dame

Arizona State lost to Georgia

UCLA beat Tennessee

Washington State lost to Oklahoma State

Washington State lost to Baylor

Washington lost to Oklahoma

Washington lost to Notre Dame

The PAC-10, who supposedly plays more BCS non-conference opponents, played 14 games (15>14, for those West Coast types who prefer self-esteem to actual math and science marks).  They won 6 and lost 8.

Head to head, the conferences were 1-1 against each other.  

The SEC got 8 teams into bowls, the PAC-10 only 5.  The PAC-10's weak conference schedule is what held USC out of the title game.  This was a down year in college football in general, and I don't really know what this post proves or claims one way or the other, but the PAC-10 is not the best conference in football.  Never has been, never will be.  The SEC will likely be hoisting its third BCS Championship banner in as many years Thursday night.