Putting The Pac 10's Struggles In Perspective

Remember how bad the SEC was outside of the conference last season?

I'm going to say this now. The Pac 10 is far worse a month into the 2009-10 campaign. 

The league just got swept out of the Wooden Classic in Anaheim, where 17th-ranked Washington was outclassed by No. 15 Georgetown, and Mississippi State condemned UCLA to their sixth loss in eight games. 

That means the Pac 10 now has just five wins over their BCS brethren in 23 tries. (Oregon State plays at Nebraska later tonight in an attempt to make it six.) And those wins -- Colorado (twice), Iowa State, LSU and Virginia -- really aren't anything to brag about. (And I won't even mention some of the non-BCS schools league members have losses against.)

Again, that's a 5-18 record -- half a win over a BCS member for each member of the conference. Compare that to the SEC last season. When all was said and done, the 12 teams in that league managed to go 15-21 against the other BCS schools (That's an average of 1.25 wins per school.). However, the three best wins -- Kentucky over West Virginia in Las Vegas, and Arkansas over Oklahoma and Texas in Fayetteville -- were earned by teams who didn't make the tournament.

After the Wooden Classic , the Pac 10 has just 10 more games against their BCS brethren. The conference must go 8-2 in them to match the equal that 1.25 win per school total the SEC earned in 2008-09.

If they don't, the 2009-10 Pac 10 will struggle to match the three bids the SEC earned last season, a total that would have been two had one of today's winners, Mississippi State, not won the conference tournament.

In other words, as things stand today, two bids would be a major accomplishment for the Pac 10 in this down season.