Pac-10 preview, 2004

Pac-10 Preview 2004

How we rank the teams in the Pac-10 conference

By: Malamute, 12 May 2004

We've spruced up some old tables left over from 2K+3 with some springtime cleaning. Using our mostly new, unproven formula, we've ranked all the teams in the Pac-10 conference from top to bottom. Call it a tabularized skinny of how the teams ought to stand after the hurly-burly is done and the battles are lost and won. Also included is the schedule for conference members in 2004.

Throw in won/lost records for the past seven years as a freebee, but not as a factor.

To pick a champion, we assigned each team a point value ranging from -4 to 13, over four different categories of measure:

Road games. This category measures games on the road in the Pac-10 that will be tough to win (-4 to 0). Some teams in the conference have tougher road games than others. Because it's a ten-team conference and an eleven-game season, each team plays eight conference games, meaning that each team misses one other team in conference play. For instance, in 2004, Oregon and USC skip each other.
Coaching. In Pac-10 play, how do the win percentage and experience of a head coach stack up against his peers? (1 to 10 points awarded). Mike Bellotti won this category as easily as Phil Knight can slip into a pair of Nike thingamajigs. Bellotti, the dean of Pac-10 coaches, has 9 years' experience in the conference and has the third best record of its current coaches. Presumably, a veteran coach in the Pac-10 with an excellent record stands to recruit better than a coach with less experience and a poor record. For that reason, this category may be an implicit measure of freshmen-impact players for next season. After suffering significant graduation loses, good coaches reload each season rather than rebuild. Hence, a coach's win percentage is a factor.

Quality Starters. It's not enough for a team to have the most starters returning; they must be ready to play some football. Hence, we measure the number of "quality starters" returning, i.e., the number of returning starters multiplied by the team's win percentage for games played inside the Pac-10 in 2003. USC won this category. It has 13 starters returning and lost only one conference game last season, garnering 11 points (2 to 11 points were awarded).

Quality Quarterback. The quality of the returning quarterback is based on his pass-efficiency rating for last season and his year in school (1 to 10 points awarded). Matt Leinart of USC won this category. His pass-efficiency rating (164.5) for last season was outstanding, ranking third best in the country. We gave him 10 points for pass efficiency and 9 points for his being a Junior ((10+9)/2=9.5, which rounds up to 10). Along with Leinart, highly-rated quarterbacks Aaron Rogers (Cal), Andrew Walter (ASU), Derek Anderson (OSU) and Kellen Clemens (Oregon) ensure that the conference will be one of the best throwing conferences in college football next season.

Table 1 shows the ranking for each team in the Pac-10. Based on the data in that table, we've picked USC to win the conference championship, with Oregon, Cal and OSU being runner-ups. Tables 2 through 5 show how the point totals were derived for each of the four categories listed in Table 1. The conference schedule is shown by Table 7 below. Table 6 shows that OSU has the most significant home-field advantage, having a 36% better chance of winning at Reser Stadium than on the road.

Using his noggin, Huskies' beat writer Ted Miller (Seattle Post-Intelligencer) ranks the conference teams thusly: (1) USC, (2) California, (3) Oregon, (4) Arizona State, (5) Oregon State, (6) Washington State, (7) Washington, (8) UCLA, (9) Stanford, (10) Arizona.

As a sleeper, which we define as doing much better than predicted, Arizona fits the bill. It has 18 returning starters -- the most in the Pac-10 -- plays four straight games at home to begin the season, and has a quarterback named Heavner. I like their new coach Mike Stoops. Although Stoops is a tough coach, he doesn't get personal with his his criticisms nor does he carry any harsh talk beyond the practice field. The players all respect him. Look out for the 'Cats.

The next article in this series will discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each team in the Pac-10.

Table 1. Our fearless forecast for 2004 is based on the efficiency and leadership qualities of the starting QB, the quality and number of returning starters, the head coach's win percentage and number of years' coaching in the Pac-10 and the difficulty of the road schedule in the Pac-10.

Team	QB	Starters	Coach	RG	Total
USC	10	11	6	-1	26
Oregon	9	9	9	-3	24
Cal	9	9	5	-3	20
OSU	8	7	3	-2	16
UCLA	7	8	3	-3	15
UW	7	7	4	-3	15
ASU	9	4	4	-3	14
WSU	5	5	6	-2	14
Tree	5	4	2	-4	7
UA	6	2	1	-4	5

Table 2. Likely starter at quarterback. In eight of the last ten years, the Pac-10 champion (Rose Bowl or Fiesta Bowl representative (2002)) has been led by a senior quarterback with Heisman potential.

School	Likely starter	YR	Pass Efficiency 2003	pts&
WSU	Josh Swogger	So*	99.14	5
USC	Matt Leinart	Jr*	164.5	10
UCLA	Drew Olson	Jr	111.26	7
UW	Casey Paus	Jr*	118.63	7
Oregon	Kellen Clemens	Jr*	139.8	9
OSU	Derek Anderson	Sr	124.1	8
Tree	Trent Edwards	So*	78.48	5
UA	Kris Heavner	So	100.54	6
ASU	Andrew Walter	Sr	127.3	9
Cal	Aaron Rogers	Jr	146.6	9

& Pts=((Sr=10; Jr=9, So=8, Fr=7) + ( PE=10, 9, 8...1))/2

Table 3. Returning starters (offense, defense, specialists)

School	Returnees	Quality*
WSU	7 (4,2,1)	5
USC	13 (5,6,2)	11
ASU	15 (7,7,1)	4
Oregon State	14 (8,4,2)	7
Washington	14 (6,7,1)	7
UCLA	15 (8,5,2)	8
Oregon	14 (8,4,2)	9
California	15 (7,8,0)	9
Arizona	18 (10,6,2)	2
Tree	15 (5,9,1)	4

* Number of returning starters multiplied by the win percentage for games played inside the Pac-10 in 2003. For example, WSU won 75 percent of its games last season and has 7 returning starters (7 * .75 = 5.25 = 5).

Table 4. Head coaches and their overall records while coaching in the Pac-10. Points=((Win Percentage (10,9...1) + (Years in Pac-10))/2. Ten points maximum and 1 point minimum.

School	Head Coach	Won/Lost	No. *	Pct.	Pts ***
UO	Mike Bellotti	75-34	9	.688	9
USC	Pete Carroll	29-9	3	.763	6
UW	Keith Gilbertson	6-6	1#	.500	4
Cal	Jeff Tedford	15-11	2	.577	5
ASU	Dirk Koetter	17-20	3	.459	4
UA	Mike Stoops	0-0	0	.000	1
OSU	Mike Riley	16-21	3 **	.432	3
Tree	Buddy Teevens	6-16	2	.273	2
UCLA	Karl Dorrell	6-7	1	.462	3
WSU	Bill Doba	10-3	1	.769	6

* Number of seasons in Pac-10 as a head coach
** Coached at OSU during the 1997/98 seasons.
*** Based on win percentage and years' experience as a Pac-10 coach.
# Does not Include 4-year record at Cal (20-26)

Table 5. Pac-10 road games that will be tough to win

School	Road Killa's	Pts
WSU	OSU, UCLA	-2
UCLA	UW, Cal, UO	-3
UO	WSU, Cal, OSU	-3
USC	UCLA	-1
OSU	UW, ASU	-2
Tree	WSU, UCLA, ASU, Cal	-4
UA	UCLA, UO, UW, USC	-4
UW	USC, UO, WSU	-3
ASU	UO, USC, Cal	-3
Cal	OSU, USC, UW	-3

Table 6. Home/Away records from 1997-2003 (Pac-10 games only; no points awarded).

Team	W/L	Pct.	Home	Pct.	Away	Pct.	Diff
UW	36-20	.64	20-8	.71	16-12	.57	.14
UO	36-20	.64	21-7	.75	15-13	.54	.21
UCLA	32-24	.57	19-9	.68	13-15	.46	.22
Tree	25-31	.45	15-13	.54	10-18	.36	.18
UA	21-35	.38	9-19	.32	12-16	.43	-.11
ASU	26-30	.46	16-12	.58	10-18	.36	.22
USC	33-23	.60	18-10	.64	15-13	.54	.10
OSU	24-32	.43	17-11	.61	7-21	.25	.36
WSU	29-27	.52	15-13	.54	14-14	.5	.04
Cal	18-38	.32	10-18	.36	8-20	.29	.07

Table 7. Pac-10 schedule 2004

Arizona	Arizona State
9/4 Northern Arizona	9/2 UTEP
9/11 Utah	9/11 at Northwestern
9/18 Wisconsin	9/18 Iowa
10/2 WSU	9/25 Oregon State
10/9 at UCLA	10/2 at Oregon
10/16 at Oregon	10/16 at USC
10/23 California	10/23 UCLA
10/30 Oregon State	10/30 at Cal
11/6 at Washington	11/6 Stanford
11/13 at USC	11/13 WSU
11/26 Arizona State	11/26 At Arizona

California	Oregon
9/4 at Air Force	9/11 Indiana
9/11 New Mexico State	9/18 at Oklahoma
9/11 at So. Mississippi	9/25 Idaho
10/2 at OSU	10/2 Arizona State
10/9 at USC	10/9 at WSU
10/16 UCLA	10/16 Arizona
10/23 at Arizona	10/23 at Stanford
10/30 Arizona State	10/30 Washington
11/6 Oregon	11/6 at Cal
11/13 at Washington	11/13 UCLA
11/20 Stanford	11/20 at OSU

Oregon State	Stanford
9/4 at LSU	9/11 San Jose State
9/11 at Boise State	9/18 BYU
9/18 New Mexico	9/25 USC
9/25 at ASU	10/2 Washington
10/2 Cal	10/9 at Notre Dame
10/16 at Washington	10/16 at WSU
10/23 WSU	10/23 Oregon
10/30 at Arizona	10/30 at UCLA
11/6 USC	11/6 at ASU
11/13 at Stanford	11/13 at OSU
11/20 Oregon	11/20 at Cal

UCLA	USC
9/4 Oklahoma State	8/28 Va. Tech (Landover, Md)
9/11 at Illinois	9/4 at BYU
9/18 at Washington	9/11 Colorado State
10/2 San Diego State	9/25 at Stanford
10/9 Arizona	10/9 California
10/16 at California	10/16 ASU
10/23 at ASU	10/23 Washington
10/30 Stanford	10/30 at WSU
11/6 WSU	11/6 at OSU
11/13 at Oregon	11/13 Arizona
12/4 USC	11/27 Notre Dame
	12/4 at UCLA

Washington	Washington State
9/5 Fresno State	9/3 at New Mexico
9/18 UCLA	9/11 Colorado
9/25 at Notre Dame	9/18 Idaho
10/2 at Stanford	10/2 at Arizona
10/9 San Jose State	10/9 Oregon
10/16 Oregon State	10/16 Stanford
10/23 at USC	10/23 at OSU
10/30 at Oregon	10/30 USC
11/6 Arizona	11/6 at UCLA
11/13 Cal	11/13 at ASU
11/20 at WSU	11/20 Washington