Sports Illustrated Ranks Ole Miss' Overall Conference Value

Sports Illustrated posits how desirable Ole Miss would be if every conference started from scratch.

Conference realignment has been the talk of the college football world since last summer when the Southeastern Conference announced that the Texas Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners would be joining its ranks starting in 2025. 

The Big Ten responded this summer on Thursday, June 30, when it voted to let the USC Trojans and UCLA Bruins into its conference in 2024. 

Both conferences will be expanding to 16 members in a few short years.

With the Big Ten and Southeastern Conference soon becoming the first two super conferences, fans of college athletics are beginning to wonder what is in store for the remaining schools in other conferences. The only certainty is that every conference is bound for quite the shakeup, and the colleges with the most to offer will be the first ones selected. 

In the spirit of conference realignment, Pat Forde released Sports Illustrated's Power 5 Desirability Ratings on Thursday, ranking the 69 Power 5 schools to determine which ones would be the most wanted if every conference started over. 

Thursday column: If we blew up the Power 5 and started over, what would your school bring to the table? The new Desirability Ratings ranks them all, 1-69. https://t.co/WxjXf3NA2O

— Pat Forde (@ByPatForde) July 15, 2022

The categories that determine how desirable a school is are football ranking, academic ranking, all-sports ranking, football attendance, and broadcast viewership. 

Out of all the Power 5 schools, the Ole Miss Rebels come in at No. 28 on the new Desirability Ratings. The Rebels are ranked No. 35 in football, tied for No. 55 in academics, No. 19 in all sports, No. 31 in attendance, and No. 23 in viewership.

Ole Miss is ranked in front of SEC schools such as the Arkansas Razorbacks (34), Kentucky Wildcats (39), South Carolina Gamecocks (42), Mississippi State Bulldogs (43), Missouri Tigers (53), and Vanderbilt Commodores (63). 

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