04-23-2021, 09:53 AM
Livescoring at this link, in case you want to do a little scouting of our opponent tomorrow: https://livestream.com/accounts/2313864/...914/player
And another thought on SEC/ACC rankings, this time a more forgiving one. Part of it is that the bottom half of those two conferences (SEC more so than ACC these days) are filled with teams that are at least pretty good. Not amazing, not gonna win a title, but consistently pretty good and able to occasionally pull some upsets. We lack that in the Pac-12. Yes, CU beat Cal and Oregon beat us, but check their non-conference schedules--not a good win on there.
Every team in the Pac-12 should be good enough to be Top 50. And they're just not. Hopefully the improvement we saw from Arizona this year is the start of something durable--we saw a lot more close matches, better coaching, and fight. Arizona should be a reliably good team. I think Colorado has the pieces in place to start being a regularly good team, too. Just need a bit better recruiting at both places.
Basically, Stanford and UCLA should be perennial national title threats. USC should recruit well enough that they're in the teens every year, and so should Cal. ASU should be Top 25. Oregon, Washington, Arizona, and Colorado should all be in that 30-45 range just about every year where they're usually going to make NCAAs. (Maybe I should expect Wazzu there, too.)
It remains absurd that so many good-but-not-great teams are ranked ahead of Stanford. But that's because those teams play, and beat up on, each other, with the cost of losing so low. Beating, say, Ole Miss or Kentucky moves the needle a modest amount. Beating Arizona or Utah doesn't move it at all. We need the bottom half of the conference to get reliably good, even if they don't ever get great.
And another thought on SEC/ACC rankings, this time a more forgiving one. Part of it is that the bottom half of those two conferences (SEC more so than ACC these days) are filled with teams that are at least pretty good. Not amazing, not gonna win a title, but consistently pretty good and able to occasionally pull some upsets. We lack that in the Pac-12. Yes, CU beat Cal and Oregon beat us, but check their non-conference schedules--not a good win on there.
Every team in the Pac-12 should be good enough to be Top 50. And they're just not. Hopefully the improvement we saw from Arizona this year is the start of something durable--we saw a lot more close matches, better coaching, and fight. Arizona should be a reliably good team. I think Colorado has the pieces in place to start being a regularly good team, too. Just need a bit better recruiting at both places.
Basically, Stanford and UCLA should be perennial national title threats. USC should recruit well enough that they're in the teens every year, and so should Cal. ASU should be Top 25. Oregon, Washington, Arizona, and Colorado should all be in that 30-45 range just about every year where they're usually going to make NCAAs. (Maybe I should expect Wazzu there, too.)
It remains absurd that so many good-but-not-great teams are ranked ahead of Stanford. But that's because those teams play, and beat up on, each other, with the cost of losing so low. Beating, say, Ole Miss or Kentucky moves the needle a modest amount. Beating Arizona or Utah doesn't move it at all. We need the bottom half of the conference to get reliably good, even if they don't ever get great.