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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/TigerWave01 on 2024-09-17 22:22:07+00:00.
This post, comparing the C-USA’s strength to the strength of the MWC, made me curious on comparing the strength of other conferences to each other. Particularly, I was reminded of the various arguments by anti-Pac Tulane and Memphis fans, saying that this Pac-12 is simply “no different than the Mountain West”. Being a rabid pro-Pac fan, I wanted to see if there was a way to disprove that argument based on the numbers. One way to do that? Use Sagarin’s ranking system, taking each team’s rating (as of Week 3 of the 2024 season) and averaging those ratings to get the conference rating.
Sagarin already did this for current conferences. Current FBS conference simple averages include:
- SEC - 82.28
- Big 10 - 77.61
- Big 12 - 77.55
- Pac-2 - 74.84
- ACC - 74.47
- Sun Belt (Divisions Merged) - 64.18
- MWC - 63.99
- AAC - 63.58
- MAC - 58.48
- C-USA - 56.93
Things start getting interesting once you expand the Pac-12. If you take the current Pac-2 plus the confirmed additions (Boise State, San Diego State, Fresno State, and Colorado State) and average out their ratings, the 6-Pac lands at 70.23. From there, you can create various scenarios. Assuming the 6-Pac only adds Tulane and Memphis, that rating goes up to 71.48. If they add UNLV alongside those two, the rating goes up again, this time to 71.91. If UTSA is added alongside those three, the rating decreases to 71.22, while adding USF instead brings that average to 71.88.
Meanwhile, assuming only Tulane and Memphis leave, the AAC’s simple average would fall to 61.63, while taking out UTSA reduces that to 61.33, but removing USF instead reduces it to 60.72. Looking out west, the Mountain West will be hit hard by the Pac-12 rebuild. When just taking out the teams who have already confirmed they are joining the Pac-12, the Mountain West’s average falls from 63.99 to 62.03. However, if they lose UNLV alongside those four, the average drops to an abysmal 60.12. And it gets worse; if the MWC takes the two most likey expansion candidates (NMSU and UTEP), the average drops even further to 58.47, just below the MAC. If you wanna add insult to injury, assume that Tulane, Memphis, and UNLV join the Pac-12 while Air Force goes to the AAC and NMSU and UTEP join the MWC. This would bring the AAC to 61.67 and the MWC to 58.01, basically neck-and-neck with the FCS Missouri Valley Conference.
But here’s the most interesting part: the AAC prior to 2023 was considered, by far, the best G5 conference. This season, the 11 teams in the AAC at that time would have an average of…68.95. To be fair, many teams (Houston, Cincy, and ECU) are having down years, but that average would still create some decent space between prime AAC and the rest of the current G5. Even then, it’s still a nearly 3 point difference between prime AAC and a Pac-12 with Tulane, Memphis, and UNLV, not to mention an over 10-point difference between that Pac-12 and an AAC without Tulane and Memphis. The Pac-12 is far closer in strength to the ACC, at a 2.56 point difference, than it is to the Sun Belt, at a 7.73 point difference.
This analysis is by no means perfect; it only takes into account 3 weeks of play, so it could age like milk, and ignores factors such as travel, media markets, and other, off-the-field considerations by design. But when looking at if the current AAC or a Pac-12 with Tulane, Memphis, and UNLV are equals, the answer is clearly no. In fact, it’s hard to group the Pac-12 with the G5 at all. They are by no means a Power Conference, even with the three additions discussed here, but looking at the numbers, they truly are at a different level of play than the other mid-major schools.
EDIT: tl;dr - The Pac-12 is far, far better than the AAC if Memphis and Tulane join. The two conferences aren’t even comparable.