Green With Conference Envy
by SMQ on Nov 6, 2006 8:20 PM EST
in News
10 comments
Usually, SMQ is only deeply, intensely jealous of Orson or Brian or other peddlers of rockin' New Media! insight and creativity, but occasionally, actual professional columnists are worth their salaries. Kudos today to the Worldwide Leader's Mark Schlabach, who ably counters Big East-bashing most vocally expounded after Thursday's West Virginia-Louisville game by Jason Whitlock thusly:
How easily we forget the final score of last season's Rose Bowl, in which No. 2 Texas upset No. 1 USC 41-38 to win the national championship. The Longhorns and Trojans combined for more points (79) and yards (1,130) than the Mountaineers and Cardinals did last week.
But because Texas and USC aren't from the much-maligned Big East, the Rose Bowl was considered an instant classic.
And never mind that No. 2 Michigan just allowed 26 points to a Ball State team that scored seven against Central Michigan. Or that Texas allowed 518 yards and trailed 21-0 in its 35-31 win over unranked Texas Tech two weeks ago.
Instead of giving the Cardinals credit for crushing the third-ranked team in the country -- a win that is arguably as impressive as Ohio State at Texas or Michigan at Notre Dame -- much of the public focused on what Louisville didn't do: shut down one of the country's most explosive offenses. What did you expect? A shutout?
[...]
"If it was a low-scoring game, they probably would have said there was no offense," West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez said. "If it was a high-scoring game, they would say there's no defense. There's still a handful of people out there looking to pounce on the Big East. I think it's kind of crazy. ... I think our league is still underrated, and I think other leagues are way overrated."
Schlabach beats Whitlock for a) perspective and context, b) actually quoting a relevant person, and, above all, c) providing a useful segue via said quote to arguments abounding in the diary initiated this morning by Will from Royals Review, a site concerned with the intricacies of the stick-based sport vaguely acknowledged by SMQ for a total of about six total hours per season (seven this year, because he had a fantasy team, The Stoics, an offensive juggernaut that was one reliever from first place in a league of a dozen, mostly far more committed Pasttimers).
Schlabach: Paid. This is fine.
Will is a baseball fan with a beef, specifically against the "exposed" SEC, "irrational love" for which is "ruining college football," and calls for a scathing expose from SMQ - who, for the record, completely agrees. Except where he doesn't.
On one hand, commenter Raymond laboriously defends the SEC, and SMQ finds himself agreeing with him that it offers a slightly tougher gauntlet and takes on at least the challenges out of conference as other leagues. On the other, though, where he agrees with Will (a Notre Dame fan, which may or may not matter), it's true the SEC is a top-heavy league (Florida, Auburn, Tennessee, LSU, and, yes, Arkansas), and that its middle (Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama and, yes, Kentucky) is a bit soft this year. And those alleged heavyweights aren't piledriving supposedly weaker foes into the ground: they're winning in the neighborhood of 26-20 or 25-19 or 23-17, or losing to the likes of Mississippi State and Vanderbilt. Hell, Georgia has now lost, in the same stretch it beat MSU by a mere field goal, to Vanderbilt and Kentucky.
Chicken or egg, though? Do Vanderbilt and Kentucky get credit for showing just how tough the league is all the way through, or are Georgia and Alabama proof the middle is really that weak? When Auburn struggles with Ole Miss, or Florida with Vandy, is this evidence of weakness at the top of strength of the bottom? Is this different than Ohio State struggling with Illinois, Cal with Washington, Wake Forest with Duke, Texas with Texas Tech or USC with pretty much everyone? Show your work.
The answer with every conference as far as SMQ is concerned is: probably some of both. Which is why SMQ has a larger problem with this business of comparing entire leagues, all of which are composed of the good, the bad and most of all the meh. What is the point of this? It's way, way too hypothetical and abstract for any substantial argument. Teams in the SEC are beating up on each other largely at random, but this is even more the case in the ACC and the bottom eight of the Big Ten and Big XII and has always been the case in the PAC Ten. Is the ACC bad? Why, then, is SMQ about to rank half of it in his upcoming BlogPoll ballot (seriously)? The winner of that upside-down mess has accomplished something. So has the champion of the Big East, which is ridiculed to the point that many attentive people wonder whether an undefeated champion from the conference has made as substantial an achievement as a one-loss team from the SEC or, possibly, the PAC Ten. But only certain one-loss teams from the SEC or PAC Ten - ask Arkansas or, going back a year, Oregon (and Cal, the year before that). SMQ thinks a team should be judged on their own merits, not those of its conference, and for the most part this is what actually happens.
Directly, this means Auburn and Florida get a lot of credit because they play LSU, Tennessee and one another, not because they play in the SEC. That sounds oxymoronic, but take a look, for example, at Ohio State: the Buckeyes do not play Wisconsin, pretty clearly the third-best team in the Big Ten, and therefore some abstract assessment of the conference's overall strength does not directly apply to OSU's schedule; even with Michigan, Ohio State's conference slate is probably about as difficult as any team's in the Big East (SMQ showed Sunday that, by season's end, Louisville will have played twice as many bowl-eligible teams as Ohio State). The same omission makes Wissconsin's schedule look awfully soft, too - but is the entire Big Ten soft, when slightly more than half its members are beating each other with little rhyme or reason? Or does the resulting win-loss ledger just make it look that way? In the SEC, Mississippi State's inter-divisions draws this year were South Carolina, Kentucky and Georgia, and Ole Miss has Vanderbilt, Kentucky and Georgia; Alabama and LSU each drew both Tennessee and Florida. Those aren't comparable schedules, even without looking at out-of-conference games, and the teams are in the same division. The Big East only has eight teams, but five of them (Louisville, Rutgers, West Virginia, Pittsburgh, South Florida) are already bowl eligible, with a sixth (Cincinnati) likely, an absurd percentage, and they all play each other. Who is willing to argue the Big East is stronger than the SEC?
Would any fan of any school in the Big East ever contemplate creating anything approaching the broadest description of this image? Case closed: SEC roolz!
So Tennessee crushed West heavy California. Go SEC! Southern Cal ripped up SEC leader Arkansas. Go PAC Ten! Which conference is better? Cal beat Minnesota. Boise State walloped Oregon State. At one end is Southern Cal, at the other is Stanford. At one end is Ohio State and Michigan, at the other is Illinois and Minnesota. At one end is Florida and Auburn, at the other is Mississippi State and Vanderbilt. At one end is Texas, at the other is Colorado. At one end is Louisville, at the other is Syracuse. Which end is the "essence" of the conference? What does the combination of Rutgers handily beating Illinois, Michigan State handily beating Pittsburgh and Iowa squeaking by Syracuse in four overtimes say about the Big East and the Big Ten? Not much. What does it say about those specific teams? That's a substantial debate. Texas getting past USC in last year's Rose Bowl doesn't prove any more about the Big XII last year than Ohio State beating Texas does this year, because Texas could conceivably beat every other team in the Big Ten.
If every team in the nation played every other team in a 118-game marathon, SMQ doesn't think the result would be much less of a hypothetical mismash. It's not that conference rankings aren't possible from analysis of individual teams, only that the differences in the outcome are negligible, almost certainly subjective to a fault, and even more certainly not relevant - not nearly so much as assessing individual teams, at least.
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errr, ecuse me?
Instead of giving the Cardinals credit for crushing the third-ranked team in the country -- a win that is arguably as impressive as Ohio State at Texas or Michigan at Notre Dame -- much of the public focused on what Louisville didn't do: shut down one of the country's most explosive offenses. What did you expect? A shutout?
Well, third-ranked by whom? I didn't have the Mountaineers in my top ten. WVa was only "third ranked" by folks who were using last year's team's bowl win.
And there's a big difference between what we saw last Thursday night and the MNC game last year. Last year's high scoring game with mucho yardage came against teams that were both actually playing defense. Last Thursday neither team bothered to try to cover receivers or tackle running backs.
West Virginia was only the "#3 team" in the minds of the people who think there's any comparison between that game and the games that real teams play.
Sorry, all that says is what we already know - the people who write about college football don't know much about it.
by JPK on Nov 6, 2006 8:44 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
I dunno, Paul...
But Schlabach at least is forcing the knee-jerk "no defense" argument to go deeper than that to explain why big yardage and point totals were more acceptable in the Rose Bowl than they were Thursday night. Whitlock moved Louisville DOWN in his ballot. Again, statistically, these offenses are as explosive as Texas and USC were last year. What's the difference? It's the Big East, obviously, and the perception that these accomplishments are the result of bad play from one side, rather than good play from the other, feeds directly into the conference comparison at issue.
Louisville's defense was pretty obviously a liability Thursday, but I would honestly question whether Ohio State could consistently stop Louisville's offense (which, remember, hasn't even had its best player since the first game). That game would have the POTENTIAL (key word there) to look like last year's Rose Bowl - or Thursday night - in terms of points and yards. If that's the way Louisville plays, as long as it's winning, I have no problem with it. The issue seems to be whether it can CONTINUE to win with the type of defense it displayed Thursday, which is a good question, but I think the debate on whether or not a team deserves to play in a championship (or where it ought to be ranked) should be based on what's actually happened, not what's expected to happen in the future. By that measure, Louisville's in good shape, and will only be in better shape, strength-of-schedule-wise, if it wins its last four.
by SMQ on Nov 7, 2006 10:45 AM EST up reply actions 0 recs
yea...
its just that there seems to be this default position on the networks and their respective pages that an SEC loss isn't the same as a Pac 10 loss and that an SEC close-call means more, even sometimes actual praise for all involved
two things:
1) also at work here is the love of all things defense, which as SMQ points out is a standard that only sometimes applies... in the SEC mythos its the land of defense, which I guess means Georgia or Alabama is generally taken to be a competent offensive team in a non-SEC setting
2) Yea, I'm an ND fan and went to school there. My friends and I used to marvel at the speed we saw on the field in the SEC and the Big 12 South respective to what was in the Big 10/ND (this wasn't that long ago). I don't think the speed gap exists anymore, in part because of the southern raiding done by programs like, umm, Louisville. Michigan's defense looks pretty fast to me. Ohio State has offensive talent on the edges that would make mid-90s Florida/FSU proud, etc.
So... is there a point, not much of one I guess, other than the fact that, as SMQ says, even if everyone played a 118 game schedule, we'd likely end up with a similar melange of gray coloured randomness and bizarre loss chains.
Not all years are created equal either. In this decade we've seen NC teams of wildly different ability, and I don't think the SEC is different from other conferences in the variable quality of its conference champions.
by Will McDonald on Nov 6, 2006 10:40 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
Sort of, yeah
There's a difference between saying "Running the table in the Big East isn't good enough to earn a berth in the BCS Title Game," and "Running the table against Louisville's schedule, in which no teams are playing good defense is not good enough to earn a berth in the BCS Title game." I don't necessarily endorse that argument, but they're substantially different.
I brought up Mark Schlabach's point on Thursday night right after the Louisville-WVA game, only slightly different. My point was that collegiate offenses are awfully hard to totally "shut down" these days, and we see some of that when these great offensive teams like Louisville and West Virginia take the field. But, it doesn't necessarily follow that because the offenses are good, the defenses get a pass.
In any case, I think that your post tackles two separate-but-related issues, SMQ, and you address one of them very well. The other still is ripe for debate, I think.
by Peter Bean on Nov 6, 2006 10:43 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
You're missing the point
The question is whether Louisville's playing any team's with a defense worth a hoot, and whether Louisville's own defense is worth a hoot.
by Peter Bean on Nov 6, 2006 11:46 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs
Wisconsin (again)
Some people say this year that the Big Ten should be the "Big Two and Little Nine"... I think it's the "Big Three and Little Eight", and Wisconsin is in those three.
What does this mean? Pretty much any team that has to play all three of those schools is going to have three losses. Penn State has played Michigan, OSU, Wisconsin and Notre Dame. That's three top ten teams and Wisconsin, who I argue should be in the #9-12 rank range. Well, when Penn State loses four games, they're unranked. Surprise? Not really. If Penn State had Purdue's schedule (i.e. no UM or OSU), you figure they're an 8-2 team right now, not 6-4, and they may be ranked.
Because of the way the schedules have worked out, it basically means that the only ranked opponent Wisconsin could have played was Michigan, because the "Big Three" beat the hell out of the rest of the conference.
by Brad Warbiany on Nov 6, 2006 11:28 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
Sounds like 2 debates
Just because one BCS conference is better than another BCS conference, or said another way, just because one BCS conference is much weaker than the rest of the BCS conferences top to bottom, it doesn't mean there can't be a debate about the top teams of various BCS conferences. I would argue, in fact, that rating conferences is part of the evaluation process for individual teams.
Think about what is yet to be settled on the field.
Louisville, who is the most likely team to be in the BCS against the Ohio State vs Michigan winner as of today, has yet to play 3 of the next 4 best teams in their own conference. Ironically, only two other teams in the top 15 can make this claim, specifically Arkansas (LSU, Tennessee, and potentially Florida) and Rutgers.
If you think Arkansas is a good football team, you have just slightly more evidence than Louisville or Rutgers is any good, because at least Arkansas won big on the road. Bottom line, Louisville and Rutgers, just like Arkansas, still has to prove they are good on the field before anything is decided.
What happens if Clemson, Miami, and Florida State run the table? They control their own destiny since they still play the games. If both Miami and Florida State finish 8-4, with Florida State finishing with a win over Florida and Miami winning at Maryland and against BC, would both teams not end up in the top 25? Just Miami going 8-4 would say a lot about an undefeated Lousiville would it not? What about Clemson winning out going 9-3? If Wake loses to Florida State, only to beat Virginia Tech and Maryland finishing 10-2, how then do we measure the ACC?
There is still a lot of football to be played, Oregon vs USC, USC vs California, USC vs Notre Dame, Tennessee vs Arkansas, LSU vs Arkansas, and Texas vs Texas A&M to name a few.
What about traditional rivalries yet to be played? Alabama still plays both LSU and Auburn, what if unlikely happens and Bama wins both and goes 8-4 for the season? I mentioned Florida vs Florida State, but what about Florida vs South Carolina? Does anyone expect Spurrier to roll over for the Gators? South Carolina also has Clemson, just like Georgia Tech still has Georgia, and Oklahoma still plays at Oklahoma State.
Heck, Oregon State and Purdue both still play Hawaii, what if both Hawaii and Alabama win out? If that unlikely scenario plays out, what if Arkansas also beats Tennessee, LSU, and Florida and in a strange quark: Utah State beats Boise State? Just that combination of unlikely events alone could make Arkansas the best 1 loss team, with a computer average above other 1 loss teams.
Great teams win games they should win, but this is college football, and Oregon State does beat USC every once in awhile, and 3-6 NC State can still go 4-8 with 2 wins over top 25 teams.
Due to a scheduling quark, we know nothing about the Big East yet, there are still 6 games to be played by the 5 best teams in that conference against each other, in other words, unlike other conferences, the Big East hasn't had the opportunity to beat each other up yet.
What does it all mean? It means nothing is decided yet, and there is still great football ahead. That doesn't mean we can't accurately compare conferences, and it doesn't mean we can't use those measurements when comparing good teams, but imo I think there are different criteria for both.
Conferences take on intangibles, like homefield advantage and comparing the #th best in one conference with the #th best of another. Teams are compared differently though, quality teams beat other quality teams on the road, and quality teams don't lose games to bad teams at home or on the road. The SEC has 5 teams that don't have a loss to a team currently ranked lower than 15. The Big East has 3 such teams, the BIG TEN has 3 such teams, the Big 12 has 1 such team, and the PAC-10 has 1 such team. The ACC has none, but could still end the year with 7 teams with 7 or more wins.
Individual teams have yet to earn anything yet, but considering likely vs unlikely scenarios, it is possible the SEC will end the season with 5 teams that didn't lose to a team ranked outside the top 25, and in the end that is why the SEC conference gets so much hype. Notice, it is why the Big Ten, and even the Big East, who could finish with 3 teams each in the same category, are also getting hype.
by Raymond on Nov 7, 2006 12:48 AM EST reply actions 0 recs
SEC v. Big-10
I'm a Florida alum living in Big-10 Country (PA), and there are very distinct differences between these two "big-boy" conferences.
Each year, each produce "National Championship Contendes." In the SEC it could be anyone of 4 schools (Auburn, LSU, Florida, Tennessee). In the Big-10, it's either Michigan and/or Ohio State. And while they always play each other, an SEC contender plays 2-3 more NC contenders.
And when your "trap" games are agains Arkansas, Alabama, Georgia or a team coached by Spurrier ... the week-week intensity needed to go undefeated is tough to keep up.
Basically, winning the SEC is like winning the Ultimate Fighiting Championship. And when you do that, you're not going to get the beauty points needed to win the pagent that is the BCS.
Last quick thought on Big-East D (or lack thereof). Sclabach and SMQ brought up some very valid stats. But my only thought of the WVU/'Ville game was that neither team wanted to play D, or knew how. Receivers were running free, lineman couldn't tackle small runners coming right at them, DBs rarely made plays on the ball. USC/Texas felt like a battle of will & skill, determined by legendary players. Brohm & White are great, but not Young & Leinart/Bush.
by Flahute on Nov 7, 2006 10:58 AM EST reply actions 0 recs
Also
by SMQ on Nov 7, 2006 1:56 PM EST reply actions 0 recs
It's all about the intern
You gotta get yourself one, SMQ. An intern - not a jargonny pooter post.
Terrific fun.
by Peter Bean on Nov 7, 2006 2:53 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs
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