Friday, August 17, 2007

NCAA Projections: Pac-10


Stuck in a time zone two or three hours behind most of the rest of the country lies the Pac-10 Conference. These guys really don't mind, as they perceive themselves as California cool, whether they are in California or not. There are some pretty good football teams on the West Coast, as well.

This conference plays a true round-robin schedule. When the NCAA allowed teams to play a 12-game schedule, the Pac-10 decided to make the extra game a ninth conference game. So, every team in this conference plays every other team every year. What a novel concept! Not many bodybag games against the likes of Louisiana-Lafayette for this conference. They choose to play each other. This drives up power ratings and ticket sales.

There is a juggernaut in this conference known as USC. USC is a well-oiled football machine. Five-star recruits are lining up to play there, and the Trojans are sending plenty of players on their way to the NFL. Any time the Trojans lose, it's an upset. This conference is USC's to lose. The Trojans should be favored to win every game. They have some dangerous road games at Notre Dame, Oregon, Cal, and Arizona State. However, I think the Trojans are good enough to win those games and finish 1st in the final BCS standings. There is currently a great tongue-in-cheek message board thread on the greatness of USC at OUInsider.com.

The rest of the conference is pretty good, but not awesome. I look for all of them to beat up on each other. UCLA, Arizona, Arizona State, California, Oregon, and Oregon State should all be bowl-eligible. Washington, Washington State, and Stanford look to bring up the rear.

Projected standings:

USC 12-0 9-0
UCLA 9-3 6-3
California 8-4 5-4
Oregon 7-5 5-4
Arizona 7-5 5-4
Arizona State 7-5 4-5
Oregon State 6-6 4-5
Washington 3-9 3-6
Washington State 3-9 1-8
Stanford 2-10 1-8

2 comments:

Zee said...

I so don't care about these teams except for ASU. You know Rhynes is going to hype USC since the squid goes there.

John said...

They play some pretty good games at 9:30 on Saturday nights. I really don't care that much about any of those teams, either.

I just root for whoever plays USC. No hate for the Trojans, but just wanting to make things interesting.