Why the Big Ten is 'superior' to the SEC - but Week 2 will settle it on the field
Josh Pate explains why he doesn't care about bowl game results for measuring conference strength - and points to this season's Week 2 matchups of Ohio State at Texas and Oklahoma at Michigan as the real proving ground for the SEC. Subscribe to "Josh Pate's College Football Show" on YouTube .
Video Transcript
Big Ten is superior to the SEC right now, period.
Was that pretty clear?
But it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter what you actually say, which is why I kind of hate talking about it on the show.
But I will say this, week two is coming this year.
So I go back to my point that I made a little while ago.
There's no guarantee that this is going to rectify itself for the SEC.
It's probably more likely than not the Big Ten ends up being better than the SEC at the top again this year.
It may be more likely than not that the SEC, let's say, has one national title caliber team maybe.
We'll just see.
And the Big Ten has like three or four or something like that.
Now of course it could go your way, but I'm not looking towards the end of the year.
I'm interested in week two because week two, it's not a press conference.
Week two is not media days.
Week two is not a war on Twitter.
Week two is when Ohio State goes to Texas.
Week two is when Oklahoma goes to Michigan.
And you know what else happens in week two?
Very interesting game no one's talking about.
Mississippi State goes to Minnesota.
I don't care about bowl games as it relates to measuring conference against conference.
I love watching bowl games.
I don't learn a thing about conference superiority in bowl season.
Not now, not back when the SEC dominated it.
Like y- to me, you can tell which conference is better before bowl season.
But if you need the cross-conference analysis, if you need those cross-conference data points, they need to be regular season games because the dynamics in regular season games are obviously way different than bowl games.
There's a game outside of those big two, which are obvious.
There's another game that happens in week three or week two.
It's Mississippi State at Minnesota.
This, these kinds of games fascinate me because we don't get a whole lot of them.
I'm a big believer in SEC Big Ten Challenge week should happen every year, but I'm not the commissioner yet.
But think about this.
The reason I don't care about bowl season is there's unequal motivation, there's opt-outs, and it's not equally seeded.
So if the Big Ten's number four team beats the SEC's number 18 by three, I didn't really learn anything there.
Similarly, if the SEC's number three beats the Big Ten's number seven by three, I didn't learn anything.
But if you could ever get me roughly equally seeded matchups with equal motivation, no opt-outs, that'd be wonderful.
We kind of sort of have a little version of that here.
Now, Mississippi State will be ranked lower in the SEC than Minnesota, but still they're lower half teams in their conferences, and it's on the road.
It's in a Big Ten venue.
That kind of game is just interesting to keep an eye on, is all I'm saying.
But Ohio State, Texas, and O- Oklahoma, Michigan, of course.
Bottom line, win some games on the field, man.
Then you can talk in the SEC.
Until then, I don't really care about the rest of the excuses.
