College Football Top 25: What Conferences Are Best Represented & Should They Be?
College football seems to recently have entered a stage of "good by association".
For instance, if a team is from the SEC, they are automatically given more football credibility than a team from say, the ACC, regardless of individual performance.
It seems fans are more and more rooting for conferences along with their favorite teams.
This is a list of all the conferences by order of strength, along with a short analysis of their place in the rankings.
If you like pulling for your team's conference, or just need to pass five minutes, it will break down your conferences' teams and whether your conference is overrated, underrated, or right where they should be.
12. Sun Belt
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Surprised?
No team in the Sun belt is even close to sniffing the top 25.
And that's exactly as it should be.
Sorry, FIU and Troy fans.
11. MAC
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Same here.
Not one of the teams in this conference is ranked in any pre-season rankings anywhere, except for possibly Jim Tressel's.
(Word on the street is that he is now certifiable)
Northern Illinois has a shot to crack the ranking, particularly if they can upset Wisconsin in non-conference play, but the odds of that are small.
10. WAC
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The WAC is in trouble.
With the departure of Boise State, they lost every team in the conference that has legitimately earned a top 25 ranking for the last five years.
(Apologies to Fresno State and Hawai'i fans)
This season, there are no teams from the WAC even remotely near the top 25.
Put bluntly, they are as close to the top 25 as Charlie Weis is to being the official spokesperson of Weight Watchers...
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9. Big East
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No.
Absolutely not.
The Big East is overrated, even with just West Virginia ranked in most polls.
Pitt and USF have sneaked into a couple, but that is just pure bunk.
The best team in the conference is likely to have at least three losses, and neither USF or Pitt will be the best team in the conference.
Watching Big East football is like watching a train wreck.
How many of you have ever actually sat and watched a train wreck? (other than in the movies)
Not many.
Exactly my point.
8. C-USA
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It would seem as if most pundits feel that one C-USA team is good enough to be ranked.
However, none of them can agree on which one.
Houston, Southern Miss, UCF and Tulsa all find themselves in various pre-season rankings.
The truth is, Southern Miss has no shot, and UCF has as much of a chance of remaining in the top 25 as Mel Gibson has to host therapeutic anger management sessions.
Houston and Tulsa, however, are a different story, and SMU should be thrown into the mix as well.
Both Houston and Tulsa have ridiculously good offenses, and SMU is not far behind.
Out of those three, Tulsa is the one that belongs, but the other two are not that far behind.
7. MWC
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This conference is probably the most intriguing going into next season.
For one season, the stars align, and Boise State and TCU will meet each other in the regular season.
(Is it funny to anyone else that Boise is hosting every competitor in the conference in their first season)
The Broncos are going to be very good yet again, but may find the level of play withing the conference to be a little tougher than the WAC.
San Diego State is being completely overlooked, and TCU can be found anywhere from 13-25 in the rankings.
Two teams is about right for this conference, bu by the end of the season, it might be SDSU and BSU.
6. ACC
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The ACC has been the brunt of some harsh jokes the last few seasons.
From "Atlantic Toast Conference" to a plethora of jokes, the conference has taken it's lumps.
They deserve it.
Miami has been held up to us by it's fans since Jacory Harris was a freshman.
"We're back", they liked to say, as he one-hopped another pass to his receivers and had a better completion percentage to the opposition than to his own team.
This season, they are going to be close.
The 'Canes fall outside of most of the rankings, but Florida State and Virginia Tech are present in every one of them, and FSU is ranked in the top three of most.
Va. Tech is as high as seventh and as low as 23rd, somewhere in the middle of that is appropriate, as is having only two ranked teams.
Until the ACC has some meaningful victories against top-flight opponents again, that's all they deserve.
5. Independents
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BYU is going to be better than most people realize.
Notre Dame is hyped up again.
Navy is prepared to go to a bowl game again, while Army is...shall we say, going to regress.
Notre Dame is deserving of the hype, the defense will be the key to a huge season in South Bend.
As for BYU, they belong just outside the top 25, so once again, the rankings have proven their eternal worth...
4. Pac-12
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Stop for a minute and think of all the guys who could be Heisman contenders from this conference.
Matt Barkley, Andrew Luck, Darron Thomas, LaMichael James, Chris Polk.
The talent out west is growing.
Oregon has some holes to fill on the offensive line and at linebacker, but still has the talent to be a top five team.
Stanford is top ten material, and that's where they are in most rankings.
The one team in the entire country that may be getting underrated is the Arizona State Sun Devils.
The Devils did not even make Athlon's top 25, and 17 is the ceiling for them in other publications.
It may be splitting hairs, but by season's end, all three of those teams could be in the top 12.
The Pac-12 deserves to have those three in, as well as possibly USC.
3. Big 12
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The Big 12 is getting some love in the pre-season rankings.
Texas A&M, Texas, Missouri and both Oklahoma schools appear in almost every list you can find, giving the conference five teams ranked in the top 25.
Texas is the only questionable one, and should they remedy the poor line play that caused last season's debacle, they could sneak into the top 20 by season's end.
The other four all have a legitimate shot to make the BCS, with Oklahoma being picked by many to make the BCS championship game.
The conference is receiving exactly the level of hype it should be, unlike the Miami Heat.
2. Big Ten
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This one is iffy.
We will excuse all the publications that have Ohio State at 15 or higher, as they would obviously move the Buckeyes given everything taking place in Columbus.
They should be ranked, as they are still extremely talented, but somewhere around 18-20 is more apropos.
Michigan State, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Penn State are regulars in the rankings, giving the Big Ten five teams in the top 25.
Where it gets shaky is when you start to break down each team.
The Nittany Lions have no one who can throw the ball.
The Badgers lost their top running back and quarterback, as well as their most dynamic defensive playmaker.
Michigan State has an explosive offense, no doubt about it, but the Spartans' two leading tacklers are gone.
Not to hate, but Nebraska also has issues with depth at QB, and consistency issues with Taylor Matinez.
Simply put, Nebraska is about right at 10-12, Wisconsin and MSU belong 12-15 and Penn State should not be ranked.
Overrated?
Probably, but then again, you never know in college football.
1. SEC
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As was probably expected, the SEC sits atop this list, with Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, Arkansas, Alabama and LSU all appearing in most of the rankings and Mississippi State appearing in several as well.
At first glance, it appears to be too much.
The recent dominance of the SEC leads me to say that it is not, however, until somebody knocks the conference of it's perch.
Five straight championships is pretty dominant, and even three to four teams in the top ten is not over much for this conference, considering its recent history.
Yes, that was painful to say, but sometimes the truth hurts...
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