Pac-12 Basketball: The advantage of splitting the conference into divisions

Go Joe Bruin examines what it would be like if the Pac-12 basketball teams split into North and South divisions like their football counterparts and what advantages it would bring.

The Conference of Champions has a few issues they need to figure out and one of those is how the Pac-12 basketball schedule is laid out. As it stands right now, every team plays 18 conference games: two games versus their travel partner/local rival (home and away), one game each against a rotating travel pair (home or away) and two games against the rest of the teams in the conference (home and away).

For example, using UCLA basketball’s 2017-18 schedule, the Bruins played USC at Pauley Pavilion and the Galen Center, played at Arizona, at Arizona State and both home and away games against Washington, Washington State, Oregon, Oregon State, Cal, Stanford, Colorado, and Utah.

Do you see the problem here?

UCLA and Arizona, the biggest rivalry in the conference, only gets one game against each other (not counting any potential Pac-12 Tournament matchups). That is completely absurd considering the fact that the Pac-12 has been vastly underperforming in recent years in regards to success, revenue and overall national attention (have you read the article by Dennis Dodd of CBS Sports? It hurts to read).

UCLA and Arizona, the biggest rivalry in the conference, only gets one game against each other. That is completely absurd.

And not to make this too UCLA-centric, this past season Stanford and Cal only played Oregon and Oregon State once. This is another example of how the local/regional rivalries are weakened. Taking Pac-12 history into account, Oregon (1915), Oregon State (1915), Cal (1915) and Stanford (1918) joined the Pac-12 before UCLA was an established university (1919). Now that is a Hundred Years’ War. One that needs to be preserved.

It is also absurd considering the conference have bent over backward for the California schools during football season. Back when the conference added Utah and Colorado, officially forming the Pac-12, the schedules of UCLA, USC, Cal and Stanford had to include a game against each of the other three every season despite the first two being in the South Division and the latter two in the North (with each team missing out on playing two of the other four teams not from their division in the consecutive years as the schedule rotates). Why? Revenue!

So is this not an option for basketball? UCLA and Arizona have been a huge draw for the Pac-12 (and so has Oregon-Stanford, Cal-Oregon, etc.), especially in recent years with Steve Alford and Sean Miller going back and forth at each other, yet this past season (and next season), they have been scheduled to play once. What are you doing Pac-12?

So, here is my solution… split them up into divisions (wait for it) JUST LIKE FOOTBALL!

This past season, the Pac-12 basketball standings were as follows: 1. Arizona, 2, USC, 3. Utah, 4. UCLA, 5. Stanford, 6. Oregon, 7. Washington, 8. Colorado, 9. Arizona State, 10. Oregon State, 11. Washington State, 12. California

This resulted in four teams in the South Division getting first-round byes in the 2018 Pac-12 Tournament. But if the conference was split into divisions, the standings would be as follows:

North: 1. Stanford, 2. Oregon, 3. Washington, 4. Oregon State, 5. Washington State, 6. Cal

South: 1. Arizona, 2. USC, 3. Utah, 4. UCLA, 5. Colorado, 6. ASU

And with this divisional split, the conference could also split the Pac-12 Tournament by division, similar to football as the Pac-12 South bracket winner would face the Pac-12 North bracket winner. Here is what the tournament could have looked like this past season…

With Pac-12 hoops splitting into two divisions, the Pac-12 Tournament should emphasize and award those teams at the top of their respective divisions. This is what the bracket would have looked like past season. pic.twitter.com/VieXaA7psw
— Mike Regalado 🏀🏈🎧 (@MikeRegaladoLA) May 21, 2018

Now you are probably wondering if this is fair to those teams that have better records, like UCLA and Utah, as Stanford and Oregon would get first-round byes. Well, maybe we should ask #2 USC, #3 Utah, #5 Stanford, #6 Oregon, #7 Washington and #8 Colorado who were all passed up for the Pac-12’s 9th place team, Arizona State, to go to the 2018 NCAA Tournament, if this is fair.

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The Sun Devils had a very good non-conference season as they finished 12-2, but once they got into the Pac-12 portion of the schedule, they went down hill with an 8-10 conference record. If the Pac-12 was split into divisions, they would be last in the South and I believe that would deter a lot of NCAA Tournament committee members from picking them for the Big Dance.

Additionally, this format would award the top two teams in their respective divisions to get a first-round conference tournament bye. If that was the case, UCLA (for example) which had a rocky conference schedule, would not be rewarded just because they have better records than teams in the North and would have them start without a bye.

First off, this would make for some very exciting late regular season games. Secondly, if UCLA finished with a better record, there would be nothing for them to protest about (if they were to) come tourney time.

There has been some talk about increasing the length of the Pac-12 schedule to 20 games, which would allow every team to play every other Pac-12 school twice, but there seems to be a little bit of pushback from some in the conference. By simply splitting into divisions, the conference could stay with an 18-game schedule as well as strengthen rivalries (and revenue).

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I am not saying that this is the best way to go about making the schedule and formatting tournament play, but it could be better than the current model and if anything, it adds some intrigue and the Pac-12 needs some intrigue after the recent press they have been receiving lately. Jazzing things up with a split wouldn’t be so bad.