For years, dating to the latter stages of the Bowl Championship Series through the start of the College Football Playoff, teams in the Pac-12 Conference have pointed to a unique argument when plugging the league’s postseason case: Unlike the rest of the Power Five landscape, we play nine conference games and a championship game.
The argument remains unique. It simply holds less water after an opening-weekend performance that can only be termed a disaster for a Pac-12 pegged as one of the top two conferences in the Football Bowl Subdivision.
Utah and UCLA have beaten non-conference Power Five opponents, Michigan and Virginia, that are trying to resurrect their programs, but their good work was undermined Saturday.