Around the Big Ten

[iam416]

No, it wouldn't. Virginia Tech isn't an elite team -- hell, they're not even ACC Champions. A win tonight just puts the B10 slightly ahead of the ACC, which is a horrible football conference.

[iam416]

A win or a loss in the post season has limited implications at face.

On a season-by-season basis, that's largely correct. But post-season play builds perception and a conference's performance over a period of years can be influential. Put another way, there is no other conference in the country that could pull off an LSU-Bama type game. But the SEC can because it has been so good in bowl games.

It also matters, to the extent it ever comes up, if you get down to a bunch of 1-loss teams fighting for the 2nd spot in the BCS title game. The SEC wins that battle, hands down. Bowl games and non-conference games matter in that regard.

Also, to the extent you build a product -- like the SEC -- you can realize some financial gains. The SEC CG is a ratings boon. If you want people to care about your product -- i.e., WATCH your product -- they have to think it's a quality product.

[entropy]

The SEC has stuck more money into football than any other conference, collectively. You have to invest to win.

[whodean]

Is that true, I thought M and OSU had the largest athletics budgets in the country?

[entropy]

Is that true, I thought M and OSU had the largest athletics budgets in the country?

athletic budgets are not the same as spending in football..

let's look at Michigan... just recently they've updated their stadium and invested in new lockers. When did most of the SEC do this? What has Iowa added to it's program recently?

[entropy]

Also think about the HC's and staff's in the 2 conferences. Ranking first to 26th, do you think the SEC or BIG would dominate the top?

[iam416]

OSU and Texas generally have the largest AD budgets.

But, entropy is right. Even if you say that the top 4 in the B10 spend as much as the top 4 in the SEC, the next 4 are a total wipeout (say, Georgia, Tennessee, South Carolina, Arky against Wisky, Iowa, MSU and, eh, Illinois?).

He's also right about the coaching staffs. The SEC throttles the B10 in the middle of the pack.

[whodean]

Football is not as much of a priority in Big10 country?

[whodean]

Timely ESPN article on the topic:

http://espn.go.com/college-football/bowls11/story/_/id/7415618/the-real-reason-sec-wins-all-bowl-games

Here's why the SEC keeps winning

Hey, you, with the chip on your shoulder about the Southeastern Conference.

You, the one who can't wait to see the Allstate BCS National Championship Game because, for the first time in eight appearances, an SEC team will lose. With No. 1 LSU playing No. 2 Alabama in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans on Monday, there may be less relief there than you think.

You're frustrated with the system. You're mad that the power in college football has consolidated in one place and you're looking for someone or something to blame. The answer lies below.

But before you can look at the culprit, you're going to need a mirror.

When you dig through the data, when you see that SEC athletic programs have bigger budgets than their counterparts around the country because the SEC fills its bigger stadiums, when you see that the caliber of play and the spectacle of those filled stadiums create the highest TV ratings, all of that speaks to the passion that college football creates among the league's fans. That passion creates those resources, which attracts the top coaches, who, in turn, sign the top players.

Even with the head start of Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State ranking 1-2-4 in attendance, the SEC led the nation in 2011, as it has every season since 1998. That's because SEC schools take six positions in the top 11. The revenues generated by that attendance put the SEC at the top of athletic spending, according to a survey by the Sports Business Journal. The median budget of SEC athletic departments in fiscal year 2012 is $90.3 million. The Big Ten is second at $78.8 million. No other conference has a median budget above $62 million.

The money, both in the resources it buys and the salaries it pays, lures the top coaches. Four SEC head coaches -- Mark Richt of Georgia, Steve Spurrier of South Carolina and the two who will be in New Orleans, Les Miles of LSU and Nick Saban of Alabama -- are qualified for the College Football Hall of Fame (10 seasons as a head coach with a career winning percentage of .600).

And the coaches attract the top players. The demographic shift in this country toward the Sun Belt can explain in part the rise of the SEC. More people are living within the conference footprint than ever. But the increased population in and of itself doesn't explain the SEC's rise. If big population made a difference, then Fordham would still rule the East.

If the 2012 ESPNU 150 is any indication, the top recruits from SEC country stay home. While the definition of "home" includes Clemson and Florida State, ACC teams who reside in the SEC footprint, nearly to a man those top recruits aren't leaving for points north.

Nowhere on the field is the SEC's home recruiting advantage more pronounced than at defensive tackle. The Deep South must be the mother lode for 300-plus pound men who retain some speed and quickness, a defensive element that has become more important than ever with the rise of the spread offense. Ask Oregon how important Nick Fairley was to disrupting the Ducks in the Tostitos BCS National Championship Game last season.

In the past five NFL drafts -- since the beginning of the BCS championship streak -- 28 defensive tackles have been selected out of the SEC. The Atlantic Coast Conference is second with 14. If you limit it to the first three rounds, the SEC leads with 15 and the Pac-12 is second with eight.

To the home talent, add the advantage of the home field. The revenues generated by the SEC schools afford them the luxury of tilting their schedules in their favor. In every other BCS conference, programs play nonconference games in their opponents' stadium. In the SEC, programs forego those road trips because, well, they can.

Beginning in 2006, the first year of the BCS championship streak, LSU, Alabama and Auburn each have played a total of two non-neutral, nonconference road games, and that's not the fewest. Arkansas and Ole Miss have played one apiece.

You can make the case that Alabama and LSU have avoided playing on the road without diluting their schedule -- the Tide has played Virginia Tech and Clemson at a neutral site and will open next season against Michigan in Cowboys Stadium, which is where LSU began this season against Oregon.

But the point is, the Tide and the Tigers can play those games on equal terms with their opponents. Alabama and LSU are 3-0 in those games.

Florida plays at Florida State every other year. But the Gators haven't played a nonconference regular-season game outside the state in 20 years. Filling those huge campus stadiums affords SEC schools the luxury of not leaving them. While one well-heeled booster has spent schools such as Oregon (Phil Knight), Stanford (John Arrillaga) and Oklahoma State (T. Boone Pickens) to the top, SEC schools have gotten there by the strength of the masses.

College football is more important to SEC fans. They show it when 90,000-plus arrive at Bryant-Denny Stadium -- for a spring game. They show it in radio talk shows that are filled with college football talk 12 months a year. And judging by the TV ratings, fans outside the SEC recognize the difference, too.

The three top-rated telecasts this season featured No. 1 LSU. The highest-rated game, LSU-Alabama I, drew the biggest rating for a regular-season game in 22 years. When you're through looking yourself in the mirror, take a look at the game.

Ivan Maisel is a senior writer for ESPN.com and hosts the ESPNU College Football podcast. Send your questions and comments to him at Ivan.Maisel@ESPN.com.

[entropy]

he forgot about pubically known things like lower admission standards, lower GPA's and oversigning..

[Jamie H]

Maisel has been an SEC pimp for as long as I can remember.

[Jeff Buchanan]

If Ivan is right, how does he explain um's acceptance of the head coaching position at osu? Why is Richt thinking about PSU (assuming rumors might be correct .... and I think they are)?

I will acknowledge that if you follow the money you'll find successful football programs but there is more to it than that .... way more. Entropy is spot on with his tongue in cheek remark above. The SEC has a culture of sleeze that is so deeply embedded that it has become not only common place but acceptable. Its the way business is done ..... like companies with multinational aspirations find when they go into places like the middle east, for example, to sell product and build markets.

Sure, it produces winning football but I'm not so sure I'd want to be crowing about that. I believe that the cooperative agreement between the PAC12 and B1G reflects the disdain these two Commissioners have for the way the SEC goes about its business. It's their egos playing as well, exp. Delaney, but putting that aside, this is a nice move to counter, in a productive way, the weight that the SEC is able to throw around now and will throw around in the future, that weight gained with an underbelly that stinks.

[entropy]

Jeff.. I think just recently, the BIG has decided to invest. Frankly, if I could get paid 4M and have a highly paid staff at florida or PSU, i'd take PSU. It would be an easier job.

sleeze aside, I think there BIG has been slow to respond to the investment.

[iam416]

The largest discrepancy b/t the SEC and B10 isn't at the top, it's in the middle. There's zero point in denying that. The SEC has 3 programs that are hopeless on the national stage. The B10, IMO, has 7 with an extremely generous nod to Wisky (MSU will never, again, seriously contend for a national title).

It's an entirely different, and valid, discussion as to whether the B10 ought to try to do the things that it would require to equal the SEC on the field.

And, yes, Maisel (and the whole of ESPN) are SEC shills.

[entropy]

as long as the BIG doesn't lose its core values in the process..