Who has the advantage?

Northern teams: Washington, Oregon, Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio St, Penn St

Southern teams: USC, Texas, T a&m, Oklahoma, LSU, bama, Georgia, Clemson, Fla St, Miami, Florida, Tennessee

I think the south had the advantage except for the last couple of seasons. Now, I think it is very close. NIL has made it more feasible for kids from the south to play for teams that are further away.

Not too long ago, only Ohio St had the size, strength and athletes to compete against the best southern teams.

Any thoughts?

It is hard to think of USC as a south team when they are a card carrying member of the B1G. I put them in the north.

Well, you evened up the teams by adding ewe dub dragging down the North and sc for the South.

A TON of SEC players have come to B1G in the NIL-Portal era. I did not anticipate how a couple of Big Ten teams could load up on portal athletes from the south to the degree that we have.

It has been quite a leveling of the playing field between the two power conferences…

48 minutes ago, Jon Sousa said:

It is hard to think of USC as a south team when they are a card carrying member of the B1G. I put them in the north.

I agree, USC isn’t a southern team. This won’t be popular, but college football has been dominated in modern history by the south. While I will admit that certainly tOSU was the best team last season, I don’t think UM would have beaten UGA the year before. Neither here nor there though, it’s not Michigan’s fault that they didn’t play GA, it’s GA’s fault, so they were justifiably the champions.

Maybe it’s starting to change, but the South has a bit of an advantage in that there are so many top football recruits that come from southern states, and also that in the south the NFL is secondary to college football for the most part.

However, NIL and the money it brings is changing the narrative it seems. The one thing some of the big Northern teams do have access to is money, and that money can bring in southern recruits and transfers. Time will tell how things will ultimately adjust, but it’s a certainty that the dust hasn’t settled yet in the new frontier of college football! Perhaps the stranglehold that the south has had may be coming to an end, or at least the playing field is leveling.

1 hour ago, Charles Fischer said:

A TON of SEC players have come to B1G in the NIL-Portal era. I did not anticipate how a couple of Big Ten teams could load up on portal athletes from the south to the degree that we have.

It has been quite a leveling of the playing field between the two power conferences…

I remember posting on more than one occasion that NIL would level the playing field. I just never expected it to happen as quickly as it has.

Now if only the 18-team B1G could find a way to level the playing field a little better intra-conference. Recently Ohio State's Caleb Downs was asked the difference in playing an SEC schedule vs. a B1G schedule (remember he played, and played very well, at Alabama his first year).

He said exactly what I thought he'd say remarking that you really only needed to be in top form for 2-3 of the 9-Game B1G contests to prevail. He then remarked that in the SEC you better be on your toes always as you are going to face "DUDES every game!" That is a bit of an overstatement but still truer of the SEC than the B1G IMHO.

Historically, I am inclined to think the North has proven to have the advantage. Princeton, Yale, Chicago, Notre Dame, Army, Michigan, Nebraska, etc for decades dominated championships.

It really wasn’t until the SEC mastered the art of paying players under the table that the South became dominant.

I think NIL has re-leveled that playing field somewhat.

I fear we are moving into an era that the schools with the richest donors will hold the real advantage.

15 minutes ago, Nevada Dawg said:

Now if only the 18-team B1G could find a way to level the playing field a little better intra-conference.

Meh. I think after this year is completed and a Big-10 team wins the 'Natty for the third time in a row, that it will be shown that while the SEC is deeper?

The Big-10 has the best teams.

3 minutes ago, PittDuck said:

Historically, I am inclined to think the North has proven to have the advantage. Princeton, Yale, Chicago, Notre Dame, Army, Michigan, Nebraska, etc for decades dominated championships.

It really wasn’t until the SEC mastered the art of paying players under the table that the South became dominant.

I think NIL has re-leveled that playing field somewhat.

I fear we are moving into an era that the schools with the richest donors will hold the real advantage.

So you’re saying that the Southern teams have only dominated college football bc they started paying players, and otherwise the northern teams that once upon a time dominated in a much different era and landscape would have continued their dominance?

If you truly believe this then I won’t even try to argue with you because it would be pointless! Come on man, you certainly know better than this!

7 minutes ago, Charles Fischer said:

Meh. I think after this year is completed and a Big-10 team wins the 'Natty for the third time in a row, that it will be shown that while the SEC is deeper?

The Big-10 has the best teams.

This I can’t really argue with, if the B1G wins three in a row, they have absolutely closed the gap at the top and 3 in a row proves it. I think the B1G has consistently had one or two of the top teams for awhile, give or take a few years in the modern era. Also, the addition of Oregon and USC and others have only strengthened the conference.

7 hours ago, PittDuck said:

Historically, I am inclined to think the North has proven to have the advantage. Princeton, Yale, Chicago, Notre Dame, Army, Michigan, Nebraska, etc for decades dominated championships.

It really wasn’t until the SEC mastered the art of paying players under the table that the South became dominant.

I think NIL has re-leveled that playing field somewhat.

I fear we are moving into an era that the schools with the richest donors will hold the real advantage.

Ed O confirming your theory. Of course, he also spent a few years at USC as well.

It used to be that if you could recruit Florida, Texas and California really well then you were going to have an excellent program. I think the same rule applies today, but I would add Georgia, Louisiana and Alabama to that mix. This is why the southern teams have dominated for so long.

Ohio State and Oregon each have 25 players on their roster from the SEC footprint. OSU has always recruited the South pretty well due to their brand. Oregon has come along lately due to NIL and their rising stock as a CFB brand. If throwing money at players is all it takes to win then the Texas schools would dominate. Much of Oregon’s success with NIL comes from helping players manage their brand.

The wild card in all this is Cignetti. If he keeps winning with 3-stars and portal players I would expect a few NFL teams to make a run at him. His ability to evaluate and develop talent is perfect for the salary cap environment.

10 hours ago, SoGaDawg said:

So you’re saying that the Southern teams have only dominated college football bc they started paying players,

If you truly believe this then I won’t even try to argue with you because it would be pointless! Come on man, you certainly know better than this!

SoGaDawg, I certainly don’t want to argue, I was just stating my opinion based on the facts as I see them. Take a look a college football championship winners over the history of college football.

While the south won a few in the earlier years. They didn’t become dominant until the best available players started getting cars and “jobs” that paid boatloads for little to no work. It is no longer a secret, it is known and acknowledged.

Although, it is kind of a moot point now, since, as Mr. FishDuck says, The Best teams are in the B1G!

3 hours ago, DrJacksPlaidPants said:

Ed O confirming your theory. Of course, he also spent a few years at USC as well.

Knute Rockne had to pull The Gipper out of a pool hall and sober him up to get him to practice.

Way back in the day, players would play for two or more teams and be compensated by all the teams they played for.

UCLA basketball players were paid. USC football players were paid.

Among others, Michigan State's Bubba Smith went to an ice cream parlor in East Lansing on Monday afternoon to be paid. All cash, nothing reported to the IRS.

IMO, two years with back-to-back titles do not cancel the SEC's postseason dominance. By every metric, recruiting rankings and players drafted, for example, the SEC is at the top.

SEC sports, especially football, have been aligned from school presidents on down for decades.

Pay for play and unrestricted transfers are evening things out. It took time for Oregon, with the help of NIKE, to build its brand and put Oregon football on the map coast to coast.

It took Texas Tech billionaires one season to open their wallets and have the Red Raiders in a position to win the first B12 title in football and be nationally relevant for more than just having an eccentric coach.

The Hoosiers under Curt Cignetti would not be in the midst of a historic turnaround without graduate Mark Cuban and his friends. Without Oracle's Larry Ellison's money, Bryce Underwood would be playing ball for LSU and not for the Wolverines.

As many have pointed out, the first question a coaching candidate for a Power 4 position asks is what percentage of 'House settlement' payments are dedicated to football and what resources will I have on the NIL front.

The most-watched game of the regular season was the Ohio State at Michigan game. For the most part, SEC games were more watched than Big Ten games.

There is a B1G difference perception-wise between the Big Ten and the SEC. Not every game in the SEC is (cue stentorian voice) a battle like no other ever witnessed in the history of college football.

In 2025, the Big Ten was dumped on for playing weak in-conference schedules. SEC in-conference schedules were trumpeted. With eight conference games, the SEC had many teams that finished with two losses or fewer, with half the conference ranked in the top 25 all season long.

Rankings like this produce results like Bama defeating four ranked opponents in a row, so the FSU loss had to be an anomaly, right? Wins over Missouri and Tennessee turned out to be no big accomplishment, but the narrative never changed.

How often did anyone hear about A&M defeating seven SEC opponents without a winning record and losing to a team with a winning record, three-loss Texas?

ESPN controls the CFB bloody pulpit and is the SEC's partner. Next case.

Six of 18 B1G teams did not finish 6-6 or better. Six of 16 SEC schools did not finish 6-6 or better. The ACC and the B12 also had six teams that did not qualify for a bowl game.

I believe the SEC has the bona fides to rank the SEC as the top conference in CFB. We could see Oregon playing Ohio State for the championship, or we could see Georgia playing Alabama for the title.

A B1G team winning it all in 2025-26 will move the Big Ten closer to the SEC. But the SEC will remain as the conference with the most on-field decided championships. And it isn't close.

Come On OBD - 3 More Wins - Please!

PS - Adopt Tony Petitti's PO format, and we will likely see an annual B1G/SEC football challenge and the money that will come with it. This season, a 16-team field with automatic qualifiers would have resulted in the B1G, SEC, ACC, and the B12, all having an additional team in the field. Plus, we wouldn't have had to suffer the whining coming out of South Bent.