Has Big Ten surpassed SEC in college football hierarchy? Examining the gap between powerhouse conferences

When Ohio State defeated Notre Dame to win the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff, it ended a 10-year national title drought for the Buckeyes and removed a large, scarlet and gray face-painted monkey off Ryan Day’s back. It also gave the Big Ten back-to-back national championships, the first time that’s happened since the 1965 and 1966 seasons when Michigan State won consecutive national titles.

It’s a rare occurrence and one that has sparked a wider debate. After decades of living under the unrelenting tyranny of the SEC, has the Big Ten overthrown the college football monarchy? Is the Big Ten now the king of college football?

Well, if you’re into recency bias (who isn’t?) then that last paragraph you read is probably your favorite of all time because there’s certainly a strong argument to be made it has. After all, it’s winning national titles that gave the SEC such a strong claim; the league has won 15 national titles in the 27 seasons since the inception of the BCS (1998), and it hasn’t all been one school. While Alabama has won more than everybody else, six different SEC schools have hoisted the trophy.

Now, the Big Ten has won two in a row with two different schools. Plus, the league got four teams into the 12-team field College Football Playoff, and three of them made it to the quarterfinals while two made the semifinals. The SEC only got three teams in, and Texas was the only one of the three to win a game (it won two). Georgia and Tennessee were one-and-done, unceremoniously dumped by the two teams who reached the title game.

The Big Ten went 2-0 against the SEC in College Football Playoff games and 3-1 against it in other bowl games. So recent results strongly suggest that the Big Ten is the SEC’s daddy, but as fun as recency bias can be, it’s not the best way to reach a conclusion.

I have another preferred method: looking at the wider sample size that is an entire season.

There is no perfect way to rank teams in a sport that features 134 programs all playing wildly different schedules against various levels of opponents. However, I like to tell myself I’ve come pretty close to doing so, using a ranking system that eliminates all bias. For years, I’ve ranked teams based on nothing but the results of games in a current season. Each year, Ohio State begins the season with the same rating as UMass, and only results from games are used to rate teams. As for the strength of the schedule, it’s all based on the rankings of teams within my system to eliminate bias from outside polls.

All in all, it’s done a pretty good job of ranking teams without our preconceived notions of what preseason polls and super handsome podcast hosts tell us teams should be. How did my rankings rate teams this season? Here’s a look at the top 10 teams following the conclusion of the College Football Playoff.

What should stand out immediately is that the top three teams all call the Big Ten home, and the fourth is Notre Dame. We don’t see an SEC team until we get to Ole Miss at No. 5 (you know these are Lane Kiffin’s favorite rankings). We also see there are four Big Ten teams in the top 10 and only two SEC teams, which is the same amount of ACC teams on the list.

Again, this suggests the Big Ten is better than the SEC, but do you remember the argument non-SEC fans used to hammer SEC fans over the head with for years? You know, the one about how the SEC isn’t actually that good, it’s just got more elite teams than everybody else and is extremely top-heavy?

Well, that same argument can be used to crack open the Big Ten’s case here as well because the next three teams in the rankings are all SEC teams, as are nine of the top 36 teams. The Big Ten may have four top-10 teams, but it only has four more in the top 40. Making matters worse, the Big Ten has three teams ranked in the bottom 40 (Maryland, Northwestern and Purdue), while the SEC only has two (Kentucky and Mississippi State). But even this doesn’t tell the whole story. After all, a Big Ten fan can counter by saying, “Yeah, well, we have 18 teams to their 16, so we’re more likely to have more teams in the bottom 40!” This fan did not go to Purdue because if they did, they would quickly point out that 3 of 18 is 16.7% of your league while 2 of 16 is only 12.5%, but it’s possible the Purdue fan wouldn’t say anything because it’s Purdue that truly crushes the Big Ten in this next portion of our study.

Here’s what happens when I use the same formula I use to rank the teams on the conferences.

Yeah, the SEC is rated considerably higher. While it’s not ultra-scientific, it is noticeable that the gap between the SEC’s rating and the Big Ten’s (1.39) is wider than the gap between the Big Ten and ACC in fourth place (1.09).

Essentially, what we can take away from this is that while the Big Ten has won two national titles with two different schools, the league is top-heavy. The SEC might not have the best team in the country these days, but it’s got a larger selection of very good teams than the Big Ten. Once you get past the Big Ten’s five best teams this season (its four playoff teams and Illinois), there’s a considerable drop down to the next tier of teams in the league. A gap that isn’t as pronounced in the SEC.

So, what’s the grand conclusion? While I won’t stop any of you from chanting “ESS-EEE-SEE” or “BEE-ONE-GEE” at each other (it’s fun to chant things, and I want you to enjoy yourselves), I’m of the opinion the SEC is still clearly a better league than the Big Ten overall.

Now, that said …

The Big Ten didn’t close the gap only this season or last. It’s a gap that’s been closed for a few years now, and it’s possible it could close for good one day in the not-so-distant future.