Ridiculous travel schedule not sustainable for former Pac-12 football teams
After finishing 14-1 in its final season in the Pac-12 - and advancing all the way to the CFP National Championship game - the Washington Huskies were expected to ride that momentum into the Big Ten.
USC, UCLA and Oregon were expected to do the same.
Entering Week 8 of the 2024 college football season, the Ducks are the only Big Ten program doing their part to make the disbanded Pac-12 look good. Oregon (6-0) is ranked No. 2 in the country and is coming off a thrilling 32-31 victory over Ohio State.
The other three programs are a combined 8-11 overall and 0-5 on the road in the Big Ten. USC (3-3) is arguably the biggest disappointment as Lincoln Riley's program continues to backslide. Midway through his third season in Los Angeles, the 41-year-old Riley is 22-11 - three games worse than his predecessor Clay Helton was at the same juncture.
Riley is clearly feeling the heat, and has been testy in his recent postgame press conferences. After losing to Minnesota he snapped at a reporter's question about the biggest play in the game and refused to let his player answer. After Saturday's overtime loss to Penn State, he was defensive and lamented the Trojans' tough schedule. Welcome to the Big Ten, Lincoln.
"The reality of it is we've played the toughest schedule in the country the first six games, we've had a chance to win all six games," Riley said. "And that's hard to do. Like, to put yourself in position to win these games is friggin' hard to do to begin with."
Arizona State Turnaround
Of the four Pac-12 teams that jumped to the Big 12, Arizona State was the afterthought. The Sun Devils were coming off a 3-9 season and picked to finish dead last in their first season in the Big 12.
Six games into the season, the Sun Devils are making the Pac-12 look good. Kenny Dillingham's program is 5-1 and coming off a nationally televised 27-19 upset of then-No. 16 Utah. The Sun Devils aren't ranked, but they're knocking on the door after receiving 39 votes in this week's AP Top 25 poll.
The other three former Pac-12 programs are faring better than their Big Ten counterparts, but none of them are ranked. Utah, Arizona and Colorado are a combined 11-7 overall, but just 4-5 in conference play.
Consider this: If the old Pac-12 was still together, the conference would have one ranked team (No. 2 Oregon) heading into the second half of the 2024 season. Last season at this point the Pac-12 had six ranked teams: No. 5 Washington, No. 9 Oregon, No. 12 Oregon State, No. 14 Utah, No. 18 USC and No. 25 UCLA.
Travel Schedule Not Sustainable
Travel is one of the biggest factors impacting the Big Ten teams on the West Coast. It was widely discussed in advance, and now they're seeing it play out. UCLA (1-5) has already played one game in the Eastern Time Zone (at Penn State) and has another one coming up at Rutgers. USC has traveled to Michigan and to Minnesota - and this week they fly to Maryland. Washington (4-3) has arguably the toughest road slate. The Huskies have already played at Rutgers and at Iowa, and they still have to travel to Indiana and Penn State.
Their combined records in those road games? 0-5.
Then there's Cal (3-3) and Stanford (2-4), who are navigating through hellish travel schedules in the ACC. The two football programs will combine to log over 34,000 air miles this season as they crisscross the country from the Bay Area to upstate New York and multiple points in between.
The Sun Devils face their first Eastern Time Zone test this weekend at Cincinnati, and Dillingham knows all too well how difficult it will be.
"If you look at right now in college football, traveling three time zones and the win percentage, like I told our guys, is very, very, very low," said Dillingham in his Monday press conference. "If you just looked at that, and you didn't even look at the football teams, you just said 'who's traveling three time zones?' and you bet on the other team, you're gonna win the majority because it's such a challenge. Especially for college athletes who maybe don't go to bed when they should like a pro athlete does when he's preparing to do that."
Travel is one of many circumstances impacting former Pac-12 teams this season - but it is arguably the biggest one. It is not sustainable - especially the ACC schedule - and it begs the question on many people's minds: How long will it last?
More Arizona State & Big 12 Analysis
Ben Sherman has been covering the sports world for most of his journalism career, including 17 years with The Oregonian/OregonLive. One of his favorite memories was covering the 1999 Fiesta Bowl - the first BCS National Championship Game - at Sun Devil Stadium.