Given that it appears our beloved Hawkeyes may be playing Oklahoma in the Alamo Bowl, we have been in a small “debate” this morning regarding “who’s dad can beat up whose dad” between the two conferences. So I had my unprofessional staff of overpaid, underworked employees do some research to prove our miserably ignorant Big 12 fans wrong. We went to the ESPN website and tabbed each teams performance over the past four years (since ESPN only runs data back to the 2002 season in their “team” section by conference). We wanted to know, by team and conference, who had the best record against teams from other BCS automatic qualifying conferences, i.e., Big Ten, SEC, ACC, Big 12, Pac-10, Big East, and Notre Dame. So, including bowl games, the premise is which conferences (and teams) have the best record AND who has played the most teams from the other major conferences. We DID NOT tab the new Big East as it would have flawed previous year’s games when many of them were in mid-majors. We did, however, count the 2005 season and old Big Easy members for past games. Here’s what we found: The ACC has played 92 games over the past four years against teams from the other major conferences. The ACC is 52-40. The Big Ten has played 84 games and is 44-40. The SEC has played 71 games and is 31-40. The Pac-10 has played 69 games and is 32-37. The Big 12 has played 64 games and is 33-31. The teams with the best records against other BCS qualifying OOC league teams are: Southern Cal, 12-1; Georgia, 8-0; Ohio State, 8-1; Miami, 8-3; Wisconsin, 6-2; Nebraska, 6-2; Florida State, 6-3; Boston College, 5-0; Texas, 5-2; Cal, 5-2; NC State, 5-2; Oklahoma, 5-3; Iowa, 5-4; Northwestern, 4-2; LSU, 4-3; Texas Tech, 4-3. Teams with the very worst records are: Arizona 0-5, Stanford 0-4, Florida 1-7, Washington 1-5, Washington State 1-4, A&M 2-5, Indiana 2-5, South Carolina 2-5, Alabama 1-3, Vandy 1-3, Tennessee 3-5, Michigan 3-6….. and a whole bunch with three games or less. CONCLUSION: The Big 12, including bowl games, only averages 1.3 QUALITY opponents per season per team… the lowest of any league. They should be embarrassed. We will assume they are.:grin:
Off topic: Great win for iowa against kentucky the other night... I stayed up an watched the whole thing. Mainly because of you. I find myself being more and more of an iowa fan.:thumb:
Thanks, and your win at Bama was enjoyed by many Hawk fans everywhere. On basketball.... what does Iowa Basketball and Iowa football have in common? .. both programs peak in November.
Good point! The challenge, however, is to continue to peak at the end of the season without losing 4 games. Learn to win ugly. :grin:
Most our guys have been together for four years now... so we'll be decent, but not great. Our slow, white, three point threats often play like they're slow, white, but without the threat. We don't have much in the post. We actually played Texas quite well last night in the Championship game. Look for us to finish with about 22 wins. The Big Ten has been down of late. It should go down to either the Spartans or the Buckeyes this year. The Bucknuts have some REAL talent this year.
lol... my bad. Yes, four losses was not part of plan A. Hell, it wasn't even part of plan B, for that matter. That's why it's always good to have a back-up school, like LSU, to root for during lapses.
Seeing Iowa do not as well as everyone thought really pained me, because they are such a high class organization...:thumb: Very easy to root for... Tate is very easy to root for...
Well, an easy solution to Iowa's late-season basketball woes involves LSU, oddly enough. Just replace all yer Big 10 games by playing John Brady about 20 times in a row and you'll go on a 20-0 run to close out the season most years. Hell, Brady'll have half his team transfer, quit or go pro before the end of January, so you'd get the last 10 games won via forfeit. What a deal!
