Parity

Is it just me, or is there more parity in college football than there is the NFL? The only NCAA unbeaten left is Hawaii and only three teams have 1-loss. There is a chance a 2-loss team will play for the national championship. (And it’s becoming increasingly obvious that the polls don’t reflect team quality, but the voters trying to gerrymander the best 1-2 matchup).

By contrast, the NFL has one remaining unbeaten and two 1-loss teams. This weekend saw NFL games with spread of 14, 11.5, 10.5 (for Arizona!!), 9.5, 22 and 16 points — margins we normally associate with Texas playing East Yachupitsville State. Last night’s game had New England favored by 22 points. According to Sagarin, top-ranked Mizzou would be favored by less if they hosted North Dakota State.

As an aside, check out the pre-season college football rankings. Current #1 Missouri — unranked. Kansas, Boston College, Arizona State, Illinois, Clemson, BYU, Oregon — all unranked. Michigan was a top five team (now unranked), Louisville was in the top 10. So was California (what a collapse!), UCLA, Nebraska (!!), Florida State (!!!) and Texas A&M.

Yeah, those media guys know what they’re talking about. I can’t find CNNSI’s football preview on their page. Guess it was too embarrassing.