Looking back at PAC 12's expansion

[Mohawk]

Expansion isn't always all it's cracked up to be. There's definitely a benefit to staying at 10 teams and playing a round robin schedule.

www.oregonlive.com/ducks/index.ssf/2012/10/goe_oregons_70-14_victory_show.html

[architechguy]

The Big 12's regular season schedule is the most difficult of the major conferences because it's a full round robin. The computer polls factor that in. It's a double edged sword though. Due the full round robin, the teams in the middle of the conference beat each other up, thus lowering the poll ranking of the losing team. For example, Team A beats Team B and Team C. If Team B and Team C don't play each other, they can both stay highly ranked, if they do play each other one of them will fall further in the rankings. In the Big 12, B plays C and C's ranking takes a hit. In the SEC or Pac 12, B and C don't play and A gets to say they beat two highly ranked teams.

Real example, the SEC's top 5 teams don't all play each other (Bama, LSU, FL, GA, SC). There are only 6 games amongst those teams out of a possible 10. If they all played each other, there'd be 4 more losses to go around, you think all 5 of them would be in the top 8 of the rankings if they spread those 4 losses between them?

[Mohawk]

True, but its still interesting for a PAC 12 school to look at the Big 12 with envy. I guess the grass always seems greener on the other side.

[architechguy]

In the end, I think Oregon will have the advantage. Whether their advantage is enough to leap KSU in the standings, we'll find out. They'll have the advantage though because two of their highest ranked opponents, USC and Oregon State, do not play each other. So they'll be spared one loss there, and they'll have the advantage of a 13th game over a quality opponent. That was the difference between Alabama and Oklahoma State last season, not having an extra game on the schedule for a conference championship game cost OSU in the rankings.

My complaint about the Big 12's round robin schedule can be summed up in a nutshell, it's only an advantage if the poll voters recognize it as such. I don't think they do. If Kansas State goes undefeated, they will have beaten each and every team in the conference, but that fact will be lost on poll voters. If Oregon or the SEC champ goes undefeated, they will not have beaten each team in their conference (and likely dodged some of the better teams), and that fact will also be lost on poll voters.