Best Conference 2008-2009

(Photo by Doug Benc/Getty Images)

Who won the imaginary best conference title for the 2008-2009 season?

Results: Inclusive and Irrelevant.

First, anyone that watched this year’s Sugar Bowl or some of Boise State’s games in the last few years has to realize that there are really good Non-BCS schools within the ranks of the Non-BCS conferences.  Also, the Mountain West’s 6-1 record over the PAC-10 can’t be overlooked.  But, I don’t think we are quite ready to crown the WAC or MWC champs just yet. 

The obvious candidates would be the Big 12 or SEC.  But that falls directly into the common trap of examining a conferences strength or weakness based off its best performers.  The argument usually only concentrates on the winning teams and conveniently ignores 70-80 percent of the rest of the conference which is composed of the mediocre and traditional losers of the league.

If we look at best BCS vs. BCS out of conference records for 2008-2009, the ACC is the clear winner with 17 wins over non-conference “BCS automatic berth conference” opponents. No other conference achieved more than 11 such wins.  Not to forget they played an impressive, 31 out of conference games against other BCS conferences and Notre Dame. 

Despite having performed so well out of conference during the regular season and sending 10 teams to bowls, their miserable bowl performance and lack of 1-2 true power house teams last year keeps them from being a unanimous choice as the 2008-2009 best conference in the eyes of most fans.

And, for sake of argument, I would add that the Big East finished with the best winning percentage over the same category of foes at .550 just barely edging the ACC who finished with a .548 winning percentage. 

Further more, through either a greater degree of parity or mediocrity there was not a lot of difference between any of the major conferences this past season.  The composite looked the same for each. Most had 1-2 superior teams, 2-5 mediocre teams (which are capable of beating any of the superior teams on any given Saturday), and 3-5 bottom of the barrel teams. This was virtually the same across the board. 

But, like I said, the ACC’s inability to produce the necessary dominant 1-2 teams to grab media attention left most of their overall conference achievements to go unnoticed. So, one would be hard pressed to convince the SEC or Big 12 this year that the ACC was tougher from top to bottom.

The winner is unclear because it is impossible to have a rational argument about the subject because of the influx of personal bias, media perception, and the creation of hypothetical match-ups that have not and will not occur.

When taking into account all of these complications of truly deciding the “best conference,” I often ask myself...Who cares?  But, it is apparent that someone does as we have all seen a development of something that is slightly new in college football in recent years. 

A large majority of college football fans appear to have sworn their allegiance to not only their favorite team, but the entire community of teams within their given conference. 

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