re: Looking @ the Big 12 OOC Power 5 wins, thankfully the Big Ten still counts

absolutely. i'm not a big fan of transitional football logic because when the teams are in the same conference you can see it often, if not typically, falls apart.

but the big ten hurt itself badly this year with pretty much everyone losing their noteworthy games out of conference. about the only exception i can think of is Indiana beating Missouri or maybe Nebraska beating Miami. tOSU lost to Va Tech, MSU lost to Oregon, Wisconsin lost to LSU. Collectively that hurts the top of the conference, and the larger conference prestige, more than the lower tier teams getting beaten up ooc

I suppose Nebraska could win out and still lay a legitimate claim to deserving a shot, MSU can play with anyone but if Oregon is a serious at large contender that becomes very arguable as well.