Conference Power Rankings: Big Ten Better than Expected in Week 1
4. Pac 12
The Pac 12 didn’t have the best outing this weekend, but it wasn’t bad. Washington State’s home loss to Rutgers was not a good look for the conference that was still supposed to be two steps above the Big Ten. Then Colorado State’s road win against Colorado gave every indication that the Buffaloes are nowhere near being back to a good team.
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In addition to those bad losses, other teams who are supposed to be elite Pac 12 teams struggled against inferior competition in a bad way during week one. Virginia is much better this year in Mike London’s fifth year, but UCLA was ranked No. 7 in the country and had no business struggling with the Cavaliers the way they did, needing 3 defensive touchdowns to come away with a 28-20 victory against a team in the bottom half of the ACC. No. 25 Washington did not have a good look either in head coach Chris Petersen’s first game, barely edging out Hawaii 17-16.
Fortunately for the conference, there were a few nice wins that kept it from being knocked down further. Cal’s win at Northwestern was a very big win for middle of the pack to bottom half conference match-ups, and other teams in the conference blew out the inferior competition. USC, most notably, looked great in Steve Sarkisian’s debut against Fresno State, who isn’t a bad mid-major team, and Arizona had its way with UNLV. Both were nice wins for an opener.