Someone explain what this means to MSU..........
he Big Ten is obviously better than everyone else, but the SEC is still superior on average. With Oklahoma and Texas, the SEC's average SP+ rating last year would have been 11.7; with USC and UCLA, the Big Ten's average would have been 8.9.
If we think broader and more historically, the SEC still has an edge.
Using 25-year averages for each program -- an incredibly broad look at program health and consistency of power -- here's how a Big Ten-SEC challenge would take shape if we set up games between the conferences' best programs, second-best programs and so on.
Best: No. 1 Ohio State (23.7 average) vs. No. 2 Alabama (23.0)
Second-best: No. 3 Oklahoma (21.9) vs. No. 7 USC (18.9)
Third-best: No. 4 Georgia (20.8) vs. No. 11 Michigan (16.6)
Fourth-best: No. 5 Florida (19.6) vs. No. 15 Wisconsin (15.5)
Fifth-best: No. 6 LSU (19.4) vs. No. 16 Penn State (15.2)
Sixth-best: No. 9 Texas (17.0) vs. No. 18 Nebraska (14.6)
Seventh-best: No. 17 Auburn (15.2) vs. No. 25 Iowa (11.3)
Eighth-best: No. 19 Tennessee (13.8) vs. No. 30 Michigan State (9.8)
Ninth-best: No. 20 Texas A&M (13.4) vs. No. 34 UCLA (8.4)
10th-best: No. 29 Arkansas (10.3) vs. No. 49 Purdue (4.7)
11th-best: No. 33 Missouri (8.7) vs. No. 51 Minnesota (4.5)
12th-best: No. 37 Ole Miss (7.6) vs. No. 56 Maryland (2.0)
13th-best: No. 38 South Carolina (7.6) vs. No. 68 Northwestern (-0.5)
14th-best: No. 50 Mississippi State (4.6) vs. No. 75 Illinois (-2.1)
15th-best: No. 62 Kentucky (0.9) vs. No. 79 Indiana (-3.9)
16th-best: No. 86 Vanderbilt (-5.3) vs. No. 97 Rutgers (-7.5)
The SEC still holds at least a slight advantage in 15 of those 16 matchups and averages a 12.4 rating to the Big Ten's 8.2. That's certainly noteworthy.