Early read on Pac-12 says amazing depth is good and bad

Last summer, back when everybody was undefeated — and where in the Pac-12, they figured a couple of teams might stay that way for a long while — the party line wasn't so much parroted as trumpeted: Hey, that nine-game conference schedule is great for strength of schedule, a sure springboard to the College Football Playoff!

Back then, with Marcus Mariota coming back for his junior year, with Brett Hundley getting all sorts of buzz, the discussion was whether Oregon or UCLA — and don't forget Stanford — would reach the playoff. Or even whether two of the three might make it together.

Yeah, about that.

By Saturday evening, UCLA or Oregon will join Stanford with two losses. And when Pac-12 coaches talk about the playoff, it's a different discussion. That nine-game schedule? They might as well be walking the plank.

"A lot of us as coaches have said, we're going to eat ourselves," UCLA coach Jim Mora said. "We're going to start knocking each other off."

But of course, they already have. Arizona, you might have seen, went to Eugene last Thursday night and stunned Oregon. Utah upended UCLA in Pasadena. And though those upsets were only two chunks of the chaos that rained on college football last weekend, they were perhaps the most damaging — to Oregon's and UCLA's playoff hopes, sure, but also to the Pac-12's.

Start with some notes and numbers: The Pac-12 is 6-2 against other Power Five leagues (with two games remaining against Notre Dame). But last weekend, all four ranked Pac-12 teams lost. All five home teams lost, by a combined margin of 19 points. This week, five Pac-12 teams are ranked in the Amway Coaches Poll, and six in the AP Poll.

It's all an indication of the league's tremendous depth — as much, perhaps, as any conference, anywhere (the SEC West is ridiculous, but there's also the SEC East).

"I feel pretty confident saying, top to bottom, no conference is deeper than the Pac-12," said league commissioner Larry Scott. "Every game is a thrill ride, as deep as it is."

And Scott is right in claiming the parity is at least partly a result of an infusion of cash and new coaches — the coaches perhaps because of the cash — that have transformed the Pac-12. He might be correct in contending that, every week, the league is the most unpredictable and most entertaining.

But is all the parity a good thing? At this point, there doesn't appear to be an elite team in the bunch.

Scott deflected any concerns about postseason implications. "It's still very early in the season," he said. "There's a lot of football to play."

But what's been played so far has the Pac-12 in a hole. Oregon, UCLA, Stanford and USC started the season ranked in the top 15 of the polls. But ravaged by injuries along the offensive line, Oregon is a shell of the team that began the season. UCLA's offensive line hasn't been able to protect Hundley. Stanford has slipped a couple of notches; USC hasn't climbed back into the national conversation.

Your division leaders at the moment: Arizona and California. Although the Wildcats (5-0) own one of the most impressive wins so far this season and have climbed to 10th in the AP and 13th in the coaches polls, they also needed a Hail Mary to beat Cal, and before that barely survived UTSA.

If either UCLA or Oregon can rebound to reel off some wins — especially if the Ducks can get a little healthier along the offensive line — they could climb back into the picture. But the very real possibility exists that the Pac-12 champion — probably with two losses, though no one would be surprised if it's three — won't make the playoff.

"I wouldn't make any prediction right now," Scott said. "I don't think anyone can make any prediction about any conference. You don't know what other conferences will look like."

But it's enough to make Pac-12 coaches lament what they see as an uneven playing field when it comes to scheduling. The Pac-12 has long played marquee nonconference games — not so much for strength of schedule as to create attractive matchups to draw fans. Then add those nine conference games, and then a conference championship.

No other league plays that combination — some play eight league games and a championship game; the Big 12 plays nine league games but doesn't have a championship game.

Scott says the combination will provide a "strength-of-schedule metric that's pretty unrivaled." But that would only come into play if the Pac-12 champion had a record worthy of inclusion in the debate. The nine-game schedule also guarantees six more losses for the league, and those losses alter the national perception. And it means the league's best teams have to pass at least one more test than contenders in other conferences.

It's why several coaches, including Arizona State's Todd Graham, have advocated every Power Five conference having nine league games and a championship game, as well as expanding the playoff to eight teams to provide automatic berths to the Power Five conference champions. But if it expands, it won't be anytime soon.

Which means in the Pac-12, the parity party will continue.

"It's tough sledding in this league right now because everybody's good," Cal coach Sonny Dykes said. "It's frustrating for everybody."

Maybe Oregon or UCLA rebounds and goes on a run. Maybe Arizona is for real. But the Pac-12 probably should get ready for tougher sledding. And maybe, when it comes to the playoff, a lot more frustration. Because it appears Mora is correct:

The Pac-12 is about to go full cannibal.