We Get No Respect

Yesterday, as I was casually perusing ESPN.com as I often do, I stumbled across a sportsnation poll that royally pissed me off, for lack of any more satisfactory vocabulary. This poll simply asked, "Which Conference is Better?" and listed two choices, the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) and the Mountain West Conference. In my mind, the results were appalling. It showed that nearly 60% of the voting populous had selected the ACC as being a better conference than the Mountain West.

Now let me put this into a little bit of perspective. My two favorite teams in college football are the Brigham Young Cougars and the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. Seeing as these teams are split between the ACC and Mountian West, I figure I've done enough following of each conference to give informed commentary on either.

That being said, let me say that this ESPN Sportsnation poll is bull$h*7. Anyone who payed even the slightest attention to NCAA football during the first week of the season should be able to see that fairly clearly. Let's review the results of the ACC's week 1 games:


South Carolina-7, NC State-3: North Carolina State barely shows up against one of the SEC's more beatable teams and is totally shut down.

Georgia Tech-37, Jacksonville State -17: I'm not going to say too many bad things about the Yellow Jackets, but last year Utah State fans were chanting "overrated" when BYU only beat them by 20 points... I think the same principle applies here.

Boston College-54, Northeastern-0: This is exactly what should have happened, props to BC for being a standout in an otherwise mediocre conference.

Baylor-24, Wake Forest-21: Do you know how many games Baylor has won over the past five years? Epic fail, Wake.

North Carolina-40, Citadel-6: UNC gets zero props for beating a team that hasn't won against a FBS team in uh... how many years?

Clemson-37, Middle Tenessee State-14: Clemson allowed 14 points to MIDDLE TENESSEE STATE... I think I've made my point.

William & Mary-26, Virginia-14: hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha... I think this is Exhibit A of my point.

Richmond-24, Duke-16: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA... Exhibit B

Alabama-34, Virginia Tech-24: Virginia Tech played a good game, and is undoubtedly the cream of this lackluster crop, but was ultimately outplayed and outlasted by a better team.

Miami-38, Florida State-34: An in-conference game that, while fun to watch, doesn't really apply to my point here.

The two most notable stats that I would like to point out here are that the ACC was 4-2 against FCS teams, with two of those wins being mostly unimpressive; and a whopping 0-3 against schools from other automatic qualifying conferences. (0-2 v. SEC and 0-1 v. Big XII)

Now, let us recap the Mountain West's week 1 performances:

Utah-35, Utah State-17: An unpredicatable rivalry game that resulted in a moderately impressive victory for Utah.

Air Force-72, Nicholls State-0: A thorough pounding of a no-name FCS school is exactly what one would expect from schools in an elite conference.

Wyoming-29, Weber State-22: The buttcrack of the Mountain West managed to irk out a win against an FCS school... I'm looking at you Virginia.

Brigham Young-14, Oklahoma-13: A hard-fought, physical victory and upset of the #3 ranked Sooners was landmark for this program and the conference.

Texas A&M-41, New Mexico-6: In a heavy rebuilding year for New Mexico, no one expected much from them against Texas A&M... and they delivered.

UCLA-33, San Diego State-14: Considering how bad this SDSU program has been over the past few years, scoring two touchdowns against as legitmate of opponent as UCLA is an accomplishment.

UNLV-38, Sacramento State-3: Domination on both sides of the ball from beginning to end by the team that should win.

Colorado State-23, Colorado-17: An in-state, cross-conference rivalry game that was well coached and well played on the part of the Colorado State Rams.

Now the same stats for the Mountain West are 3-0 against FCS teams and 2-2 against automatic qualifying teams (2-1 v. Big XII, 0-1 v. Pac-10)

Now as you can see, the Mountain West and ACC have not yet played any head-to-head matchups, which would very much help to determine which conference is "better". But don't be too discouraged, because on this very day Texas Christain will play Virginia in Charlottesville, a week from today, BYU will play Florida State in Provo, and in two weeks TCU will match up against Clemson in South Carolina. You can pretty much guarantee that TCU will trash a Virginia team that was defeated convincingly by an FCS foe last week. In the next two weeks the class of the Mountain West will go up against the upper echelons of the ACC, and it will be then that we will see which conference prevails.