| Daily Blog • July 5, 2010 |
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First, I hope you and your families had a very happy and safe 4th of July weekend!
For the next two weeks, I will be taking a look at the conference teams of the decade for 2000-2009. Factored into my analysis will be conference win %, conference and division titles, bowl games and bowl wins. I will also include BCS bowl wins, final AP rankings and number of national championships for the major conferences. There have been several teams who have changed conferences during that time and I will include them in the analysis for any season(s) they were affiliated with that certain conference. I will also be doing a breakdown of how the conference did in bowl games during the decade and I will emphasis the overall win/loss record, the number of BCS bowl wins, and the records against Non-BCS and ranked bowl teams.
While some conferences may have no-brainers as the top team, other conferences were very competitive over the past decade. Here is the schedule for the upcoming week with the conferences I will be analyzing on each date.
June 28 Sun Belt
June 29 MAC
June 30 WAC
July 1 CUSA
July 2 MWC
July 3-4 Big East
Today Pac-10
Tomorrow ACC
Wednesday Big 12
Thursday Big 10
Friday SEC
July 10-11 Conference Bowl Records
Unlike all the conferences I have done so far the Pac-10 has had the same members for the last couple of decades. Naturally that will change in the upcoming decade with the recent additions of Utah and Colorado. Outside of the top team, the conference has been very competitive and I was surprised to see that only four teams had winning conference records in the decade. Here are my rankings for Pac-10 team of the decade for 2000-2009.
Pac-10 Rankings 2000-2009
Rk |
Team | Wins |
Losses |
Win % |
Titles |
# of Bowls |
Bowl Wins |
AP Top 25 |
AP Top 10 |
BCS Bowl Wins |
Natl Champ |
1 |
USC | 64 |
20 |
76.20% |
7 |
9 |
7 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
2 |
2 |
Oregon | 57 |
27 |
67.90% |
3 |
9 |
4 |
6 |
3 |
1 |
0 |
3 |
Oregon St | 51 |
33 |
60.70% |
1 |
8 |
6 |
4 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
4 |
California | 43 |
41 |
51.20% |
1 |
7 |
5 |
3 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
5 |
Washington St | 33 |
51 |
39.30% |
1 |
3 |
2 |
3 |
3 |
0 |
0 |
From 1950 to 1989 a period that ended with three consecutive appearances in the Rose Bowl, USC had only eight seasons in which they lost at least five games. However, Pete Carroll in 2001 took over a program that reached that five loss total nine times (includes his first season) and were one of the most underachieving teams in the country. However in the past decade USC clearly was the best team in the Pac-10 with 7 titles, 6 BCS Bowl wins, 7 AP Top 10 finishes and 2 national championships. The Trojans easily had the best win % with 76.2% as well.
Oregon comes in at #2 fresh off their Rose Bowl appearance LY as the Ducks had 3 titles, 9 bowls, 3 AP Top 10 appearances and the conference’s 2nd best win % at 67.9%.
Their in-state rival Oregon St comes in at #3 with a 60.7% win % as the Beavers went 6-2 in bowl games including a BCS win in 2000. Jeff Tedford did a great job with Cal this past decade as he inherited a program that had 5 consecutive losing seasons and were just 1-10 in 2001. Under Tedford the Bears have had 8 straight winning seasons and were 5-2 in bowl games.
Normally I would not list a team that had a losing record but the remaining six teams in the conference all were below .500 and I was surprised to see Washington St appear at #5 in my list. Despite just a 39.3 % win %, don’t forget the Cougars started the decade with a Pac-10 title and 3 straight AP 10 finishes a feat none of the other remaining teams can claim. Also I was surprised to see Arizona with the worst record of all Pac-10 teams with just a 35.7% win % last decade.
Here are the bowl records for every Pac-10 team in the past decade.
Pac-10 Bowl Records '00-'09
| Team | Overall |
vs BCS |
vs Non-BCS |
vs Ranked |
BCS Bowls |
Rec as Ranked |
| USC | 7-2 |
7-1 |
0-1 |
6-1 |
6-1 |
6-1 |
| Oregon | 4-5 |
4-4 |
0-1 |
4-3 |
1-1 |
3-2 |
| Oregon St | 6-2 |
5-1 |
1-1 |
2-2 |
1-0 |
3-1 |
| California | 5-2 |
3-1 |
2-1 |
1-2 |
0-0 |
1-1 |
| Washington St | 2-1 |
2-1 |
0-0 |
1-1 |
0-1 |
2-1 |
| Arizona St | 2-4 |
2-3 |
0-1 |
0-2 |
0-0 |
1-1 |
| Washington | 1-2 |
1-2 |
0-0 |
1-1 |
1-0 |
1-1 |
| UCLA | 3-5 |
1-2 |
2-3 |
0-1 |
0-0 |
1-0 |
| Stanford | 0-2 |
0-2 |
0-0 |
0-0 |
0-0 |
0-2 |
| Arizona | 1-1 |
0-1 |
1-0 |
1-1 |
0-0 |
0-1 |
| Overall | 31-26 |
25-18 |
6-8 |
16-14 |
9-3 |
18-11 |
With the help of USC, Oregon St and California (combined 18-6) the Pac-10 finished with a 31-26 overall record (54.4%). It is noteworthy that the conference really underachieved vs Non-BCS conferences with just a 6-8 record including a 5-6 mark against the MWC. The conference did have an impressive 9-3 mark in BCS games thanks in large part to USC’s 6-1 record! The conference also had a 18-11 mark for ranked teams.
Also please check PhilSteele.com everyday to get my FCS Top 25 Countdown, which continues with #16 Weber St. Thru July 20th, I will post both magazine pages on a new team ranked in the Top 25 and you can get an early look on how I breakdown your favorite FCS team. Remember those magazine pages are available for only 24 hours for you to download as the next team will be posted the following day.
Only 59 Days Until the First College Football Game!!!