{"id":38348,"date":"2021-03-26T16:15:05","date_gmt":"2021-03-26T20:15:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=38348"},"modified":"2021-03-26T16:15:05","modified_gmt":"2021-03-26T20:15:05","slug":"no-the-pac-12-is-not-the-best-conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2021\/03\/26\/no-the-pac-12-is-not-the-best-conference\/","title":{"rendered":"No, The PAC-12 Is Not the Best Conference"},"content":{"rendered":"

Will all of you just stop? Listen to yourselves. Yes, the PAC-12 has had a remarkable first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, but that doesn\u2019t mean they are the best conference in the country, or even close to it.<\/span><\/p>\n

The league is 9-1 in the tournament so far, with four of the five teams that made it to the tournament advancing to the Sweet 16. The lone loss was Colorado\u2019s 71-53 loss to Florida State in the Round of 32. Despite being the worst of the high-major conferences for years now, this impressive run suddenly has people thinking that the PAC-12 is the best conference in the country, especially better than the leagues that have struggled in the tournament.<\/span><\/p>\n

The PAC-12 is Not the Best Conference<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Other Conferences Struggling<\/strong><\/h3>\n

People have been bashing the Big-10<\/a>, widely regarded as the best league in the country for the entire regular season, for its poor performances in the tournament. Nine Big-10 teams made it to the tournament, but only one made it to the Sweet 16. Some of the tournament\u2019s most notable upsets have also come at the expense of Big-10 schools with 15-seed Oral Roberts beating 2-seed Ohio State and 13-seed North Texas beating 4-seed Purdue.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some people have attributed the Big-10\u2019s struggles to the conference \u201cbeating each other up\u201d during league play, or the fact that their conference tournament was in the same place as the NCAA tournament. I don\u2019t know if either of these played a factor, but I do know that one weekend doesn\u2019t cancel out an entire season of data.<\/span><\/p>\n

Much less talked about for some reason is the fact that the Big-12 also has just one team remaining despite also being in the conversation for the best conference in the country.<\/span><\/p>\n

The PAC-12 has more Sweet 16 teams than these two conferences combined, so they must be better, right? Of course not, and you only need to look at the remaining PAC-12 teams\u2019 body of work to see that.<\/span><\/p>\n

Resumes<\/strong><\/h3>\n

If the PAC-12 is the best, then they sure did a great job of keeping it a secret with their non-conference records. Just look at the four remaining teams in the tournament. USC had easily the strongest non-conference, defeating BYU 79-53. All credit to USC; that\u2019s a great win. They also lost to UConn 61-58, the only other high-major team that they played.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oregon beat Seton Hall\u00a0but lost to Missouri. And not to take anything away from their win against Iowa, but they had the benefit of getting a game off due to <\/span>VCU testing positive for COVID-19<\/span><\/a>. We saw in the conference tournaments that teams tended to perform well after they had a game canceled due to their opponent getting COVID. Think Texas over Oklahoma State, Florida State over North Carolina, and Georgia Tech over Florida State.<\/span><\/p>\n

UCLA\u2019s best non-conference win was a 15-point loss to San Diego State. They also entered the tournament on a four-game losing streak, so apologies for not picking them to make it this far.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oregon State was picked to finish last in the conference. They ended up finishing 6th and then winning the conference tournament, something they needed to do to earn a bid to the NCAA Tournament. Now as a 12-seed they\u2019ve defeated 5-seed Tennessee and 4-seed Oklahoma State. It\u2019s genuinely a great story. It\u2019s the closest thing you can get to a real Cinderella being from a major conference.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

However, there was nothing to indicate they could be this good. Their non-conference featured losses to Wyoming and Portland, or is that just my east-coast bias talking? Before the PAC-12 Tournament, they only had two wins over tournament teams.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conference of \u201cChampions\u201d<\/strong><\/h3>\n

If I hear Bill Walton call the PAC-12 the \u201cconference of champions\u201d one more time I\u2019m going to pull my hair out. The \u201cconference of champions\u201d hasn\u2019t won the NCAA basketball championship since 1997. The PAC-12 is the conference of champions only in the sense that every year, someone wins the PAC-12 championship.<\/span><\/p>\n

Even for the constant praise of the PAC-12, and the constant criticism that the Big-10 and Big-12 have received in the last few days, who do you think is more likely to actually win the tournament: 1-seed Michigan from the Big-10, 1-seed Baylor from the Big-12, or any of the six through 12-seed PAC-12 teams? I thought so.<\/span><\/p>\n

Main Photo
\nEmbed from Getty Images<\/a>