Pac-12 placed one team in final AP top-25 poll
What that says and why it matters
Judgment has been rendered. The final Associated Press top-25 poll is out, and it confirms exactly what we pondered, witnessed and discussed:
Collectively, the Pac-12 underperformed in 2020, even when accounting for COVID chaos — for the late start and canceled game and truncated postseason.
Granted, the end- ofseason AP poll is hardly a perfect measure of success.
But the sport’s sprawling, messy postseason leaves us with only imperfect tools for judgment beyond the teams involved in the College Football Playoff.
Of those tools, the AP poll stands above.
First published in 1936 — and with a process that has remained largely unchanged — it serves as a benchmark for comparing conference and team success across years and decades.
The broader your scope, the more clarity the AP poll provides.
In the poll released last night following the national championship game, the Pac-12 is represented by one team.
USC is No. 21, four spots below Liberty but four above Buffalo.
There’s no Oregon or Washington, no Utah or Stanford.
It’s the first time since 1999 that the conference placed just one team in the final poll.
(Full disclosure: USC was the only Pac-12 team on my final ballot.)
Yes, yes, yes: The COVID disruption must be considered — strongly — in any assessment of the Pac-12’s performance.
The conference started later than its peers, played fewer games than its peers and sent fewer teams (two) to the postseason than its peers.
Those factors undoubtedly undermined its representation in the final AP poll.
That said …
• The Mid-American Conference started when the Pac-12 started, and it placed two teams in the final AP poll (Buffalo and Ball State).
• The Big Ten started just two weeks before the Pac-12, and it placed four teams in the final poll (Ohio State, Northwestern, Indiana and Iowa).
But again, the weeds are difficult to navigate. The AP poll is better served as a tool for spotting multiyear trends — as a means
of illuminating the landscape.
With that in mind, the Hotline examined the final AP poll for each season since the conference added Utah and Colorado.
The trend line is all wrong for the Pac-12.
2011 (THRii TiAMS)
No. 4 Oregon
No. 6 USC
No. 7 Stanford
2012 (THRii)
No. 2 Oregon
No. 7 Stanford
No. 20 Oregon State 2013 (SIX)
No. 9 Oregon
No. 11 Stanford
No. 16 UCLA
No. 19 USC
No. 21 ASU
No. 25 Washington 2014 (SIX)
No. 2 Oregon
No. 10 Arizona
No. 14 UCLA
No. 15 ASU
No. 22 Utah
No. 24 USC
2015 (THRii)
No. 3 Stanford
No. 17 Utah
No. 19 Oregon 2016 (lIVi)
No. 3 USC
No. 4 Washington No. 12 Stanford No. 17 Colorado No. 23 Utah
2017 (THRii)
No. 12 USC
No. 16 Washington
No. 20 Stanford
2018 (TWO)
No. 10 Washington State No. 13 Washington
2019 (TWO)
No. 5 Oregon
No. 16 Utah
2020 (one)
NO. 21 USC
So we’re left to wonder ...
• What accounted for the mid-decade success, with at least five teams in the final AP poll in 2013, 2014 and 2016?
(In both ’14 and ’16, the Pac-12 produced playoff participants, its only playoff participants in the event’s seven-year history.)
• What has caused the ongoing regression, with three consecutive years of no more than two teams in the final poll?
Essentially, this: Why so many good teams a half decade ago and so few good teams recently?
The downturn in AP poll representation validates the national narrative, which itself bottomed out this season when
ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit, the most influential voice in the sport, said the Pac-12 has “become less respected than the American.”
Or is it the other way around, with the national narrative affecting the judgment of AP voters? (The lack of non- conference games rendered polling more subjective than usual this season.)
Bottom line:
The AP poll, the media narrative, the selection committee rankings — each piece of the machinery is connected to the results on the field.
And in recent years, the Pac-12 has lost too many early- season intersectional showdowns and too many marquee postseason duels.
National relevance is based on playoff participation, which, in turn, is based on the strength at the top of the conference.
While the Pac-12 does parity better than anybody, it doesn’t have the heavyweights.
The reasons for this are well documented — from the expanding revenue gap to the limited TV exposure to the scheduling to the tepid success of individual teams, USC first and foremost.
There is a compounding element, as well.
The lack of playoff participants increases the likelihood that elite recruits from the west coast will seek glory in other leagues, which undercuts the talent on Pac12 rosters and makes reaching the CFP even more difficult, thereby exacerbating the struggle to retain top talent and bolster rosters.
(The exodus of talent will be on full display next season, when a slew of title contenders from the ACC, SEC, Big Ten and Big 12 rely on starting quarterbacks from the Pac-12 footprint.)
As we turn our attention to 2021, it’s clear the conference is in the midst of a downturn not easily reversed, unfolding at a precarious time and, as the AP poll suggests, accelerating with each passing season.