Big XII North vs. South

One of my favorite times of the year is fast approaching. The beginning of College Football will soon be here. The Big XII is having their media days this week and the 2009 season kicks off 5 weeks from this Thursday. The conference enters its 14th season since it began in 1996. I thought I would take a look back at its brief history and compare the North and South divisions and how they have compared against one another and as a whole as well.

The perception in recent seasons is that the South is superior to the North and that is certainly the case. The two divisions play a total of 18 regular season games against one another on a two year home and home rotating schedule. There is of course a conference championship game as well at the end of the regular season. The South leads the all time regular season 132-102. The first two years of conference play 1996 and 1997 had the North with a 12-6 advantage each year, since that time they have only won the season series twice and those were by a 10-8 margin. The South has dominated of late as they have won the season series 6 of the last 7 years and two of those including last year was by a whopping 15-3 margin.

Things don't get much better for the North regarding the conference title game either. The South holds a 9-4 advantage with a current five game win streak in that annual game. The conference championship has to this point been dominated by seven of the twelve league members as far as participants are concerned. Oklahoma almost owns it going 6-1. Nebraska and Texas have each gone 2-2, Colorado was North champ in four out of five years stand 1-3, followed by Kansas State 1-2, Texas A&M 1-1 and Missouri representing the North the last two years stands at 0-2.

The conference can be proud that is has been in six of the eleven BCS championship games since the Bowl Chanpionship Series began in 1998. Oklahoma and Texas have each won that game once with Nebraska being the other team to play in it from the Big XII. The conference is 6-9 overall in BCS bowl games. The Big XII stands 45-47 in all bowl games since their conference inception in 1996.

At the end of last season ESPN rated an historic top 25 based on a multitude of data and accomplishments since 1936 which was the first season of the AP poll. The Big XII was well represented placing five teams in the overall top 25. Colorado was tied for 22nd, Texas A&M was 20th, Texas finished 7th, Nebraska 5th and Oklahoma finished as the number one team in historical context.