| | By Ed Graney
Special to ESPN.com
Mothers everywhere are championing Pac-10 football today.
Pass the meat and potatoes, please.
You really can't blame the league's coaches. They are desperate for a reason, any reason, on how best to explain their worst season since 1983.The dismal non-conference record last year. The pitiful bowl results. The shame (and beatings) inflicted from Austin to South Bend, from Lincoln to Columbus.
The fact their champion lost to Texas by 52 points and to San Jose State by, well, who cares? It's the fricking Spartans.
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Chew on this
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It might take a little more than a training table to get the Pac-10 back to being one of the top conferences. How bad has it been? Here are a few nuggets the conference isn't exactly bragging about:
The Pac-10 was 20-18 against non-conference opponents, its worst mark since 1990.
The Pac-10 is 2-8 in the last two bowl seasons.
The Pac-10 is 1-7 in the last eight Rose Bowls.
The Pac-10 hasn't had a Heisman Trophy winner since 1981.
The Pac-10 is 5-11 vs. other BCS conferences since Dec. 1998.
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But wait. Help is on the way in the form of a chicken breast sandwich.The
league's athletic directors have approved legislation to provide athletes year-round training table, common in most major conferences.
"It's really going to help," said UCLA coach Bob Toledo. "We will be able
to feed our kids all year now. Most of our players live off candy bars and soda during the summer. But not now. We'll be put on a more even playing field."
Our best guess: Florida State and Nebraska aren't quivering in their ranch
dressing.
The Pac-10s national decline (its last consensus national champion was USC
in 1972) isn't just about a nutritional disadvantage. It takes more than a brick to build a home and much more than a bad diet to deflate 10 football programs that exist in a self-proclaimed "Conference of Champions."
Much, much more.
Consider:
Recruiting: There was a time, not so long ago, when California prep stars rarely ventured beyond Pasadena to play college ball. But more and more, Top 25 programs outside the west are selling their product. And more and more -- as with Miami-bound linebacker D.J. Williams from Concord De La Salle, considered by some to be the best prep defensive player in the country last year -- players are buying it.
"It never used to happen," said Oregon State coach Dennis Erickson. "Ever. I think it's obvious football is a bigger deal to people back in places like the Midwest and Florida. I also think it's pretty impressive for a recruit to stand on the sidelines in front of 100,000 people at Michigan or 80,000 at Florida State."
Game times don't help. Oregon kicked off five times last season at 10 p.m.
in the east. Know this: If the average 17 to 18-year old was indeed on a couch
at that time on a Saturday night, he probably wasn't alone or watching football.
"We're losing local kids and those in other parts of the country aren't seeing enough of us," Erickson said. "That's a bad combination."
Style of play: It is an exciting brand of football, these West Coast attacks of trips here and there, of multiple this and that, of middle screens to deep outs. It has also made the conference weaker where it counts most. Up front.
This is a league built on speed and when you recruit to that entity, you become less beefy than those from the Big 10 and Big 12 and SEC. You show up at Notre Dame (as Arizona State did last season) and get run over 48-17. You line up against Texas (remember this, Stanford?) and are embarrassed 69-17. You invade Nebraska (so sorry, Cal) and leave a 45-zip loser.
"As a conference, we don't dominate on defense," said Oregon coach Mike Bellotti. "We haven't been able to recruit the kind of people that would allow us to control the line of scrimmage.
"And when you go on the road and play a team from one of the other major
conferences, in bad weather and in their stadium, it's not enough just to throw the ball."
Parity: It is perhaps the weakest of all reasons, given the fact every major conference except the ACC (which Florida State owns) traditionally won't go a few years without some movement in the standings. Pac-10 coaches, though, are adamant about one point: Theirs is the nation's toughest league top to bottom.
"The truth is, we beat each other up and that affects our records, which affects the perception others have about us," said Arizona coach Dick Tomey. "Hey, I was around this league when one or two teams dominated every year. It wasn't very fun. No conference has our balance. There are no weeks off."
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All it's going to take is us going out and proving we can beat teams from other leagues. Our conference struggled, it had a down year, but we're good enough to bounce back. ” |
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— Washington QB Marques Tuiasosopo |
There is, however, a simple solution to all of it, an easy answer for the skeptics.
W-I-N.
The conference will be handed several opportunities to shed its lightweight image this season. In fact, circle Sept. 9 on your calendar. Circle it in red. Ohio State at Arizona. Utah at Cal. Oregon at Wisconsin. Colorado at USC. Fresno State at UCLA. Miami at Washington. San Jose State (there it is again) at Stanford. Oregon State at New Mexico.
And there are these matchups: USC against Penn State in the Kickoff Classic on Aug. 27; Alabama at UCLA on Sept. 2; Texas at Stanford on Sept. 16.
"All it's going to take is us going out and proving we can beat teams from other leagues," said Washington senior quarterback Marques Tuiasosopo. "I don't think it's a major problem. Our conference struggled, it had a down year, but we're good enough to bounce back.
"Did we lose ground? I don't think so. But if so, we'll make it up this year. We can talk about all the reasons in the world why it happened, but nothing matters until we prove it was a fluke."
And if that's not good enough, have another scoop of ice cream with that
apple pie.
Ed Graney covers college football for the San Diego Union Tribune. He can be reached at ed.graney@uniontrib.com.
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