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I'm tired of hearing about how bad the ACC is. This conference has done better than a lot of people have expected, and it simply isn't the worst BCS conference in college football...

Five Reasons Why The ACC Is Better Than The Pac-10

by Justin Cocchiola (Scribe)

3

247 reads

Opinion

October 07, 2008


I'm tired of hearing about how bad the ACC is. 

This conference has done better than a lot of people have expected, and it simply isn't the worst BCS conference in college football.  In my opinion the Pac-10 is worse than the ACC, and I'll give you five reasons why.

1. The Pac-10 has a total of 10 teams in the conference and five of them are under .500. Only four teams are above the .500 mark.  The ACC has 12 teams and nine of them are above the .500 mark, with only three below it.

2. Both conferences have embarrassing losses, both in conference and out of conference.  Virginia Tech lost to East Carolina, Wake Forest lost to Navy, Maryland fell to Middle Tennesse State and beat California, Clemson was embarrassed by Alabama, Arizona (who sits atop the Pac-10) has a loss to New Mexico, USC fell to Oregon State who was defeated by Stanford, UCLA was destroyed by BYU who almost fell to win-less Washington, and Arizona State fell to UNLV.

3. The Pac-10's best team is probably better than the ACC's best team.  Then again, who would you take, East Carolina or Oregon State?

4. The ACC has more talent spread throughout the conference than the Pac-10.  The two worst teams in the Pac-10 have a combined 1-10 record, with the lone win coming against Portland State.  The ACC's worst two teams are a combined 4-7.

5. ACC has less bias.  Clemson lost to #24 ranked Alabama and fell from number nine in the nation to number 26.  USC lost to Oregon State, who was 1-2 at the time, and fell from number one to number nine.  Sure USC beat Ohio State, but is anyone really sold on Ohio State?  Virginia Tech lost to ECU, who then beat eighth ranked West Virginia the next week, and it took Virginia Tech four weeks to crack the AP Poll.  Now the ACC has three teams ranked in the top 25, and the Pac-10 has one team somehow ranked in the top 10.  Shouldn't Georgia be ranked higher than USC?  It's just a thought.

Author Poll

Which conference is better?

  • ACC
  • PAC10
vote to see results
Author Poll Results

Which conference is better?

  • ACC

    60.0%
  • PAC10

    40.0%
  • Total votes: 15
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3 comments Last one added 9 months ago — Leave a Comment

  1. ...

    Pac-10 is having a tough down year. If there is ever a year for the acc to make this claim, it is this year. I could still make an argument that the pac-10 is better,but us west coasters will just have to deal with it this year. Something more interesting, any think the big 12 might have surpassed the SEC THIS year? Year to year, each conference will have its ups and downs, but we all know that over the past 10 years it would go SEC, Big 12/pac10, big 10, acc, big east. Get your jabs in now, next year the college landscape will change again...

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    If anything the ACC is on the rise. Miami and Virginia Tech both have very young teams, and Florida State and Clemson have had very good recruiting classes. The ACC is going no where but up in the next few seasons.

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  3. ...

    as a pac-10 homer (feeling a bit humbled by the mountain west this year), I'd like to look a little closer at this...

    1) most of these games are out of conference. For this point to be meaningful, who has faced a tougher out of conference slate? Not saying the ACC hasn't faced a number of tough programs, but what would the W/L record look like if you took out all I-AA teams?

    2) I think the Pac-10 definitely has more embarassing losses this year.

    3) I think USC would probably beat the best ACC team, pretty easily. But the rest of the conference? Its a crap shoot.

    4) Washington and WSU are terrible this year, I don't doubt that Virginia and NC State are better than them. But two of those four wins were against I-AA schools, and even WSU can beat a I-AA school like a red headed step child. So instead of 1-10 vs 4-7, its more like 0-10 vs 2-7.

    5) I don't know that I'd call it bias... Clemson lost to what people thought at the time was a mediocre Alabama team to open the year, while USC beat the snot out of Virginia and The Ohio State. I'll withhold my judgement on Georgia vs USC for the results this weekend, when ASU plays USC. One-off opponents are second best way to rate. Do you think Clemson should still be ranked? Do you think USC to 11 was too low? How big is the "bias"?

    Anyways, I'd say the matchup this year between ACC and Pac-10 seems close. We do get one bowl game against each other =)

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