<p>I nominate:
ACC, Patriot, Big Ten
What is the smartest conference? Nominate, discuss, and cast your vote.</p>
<p>pac 10: stanford, UCLA, UC Berkeley, USC, UW, etc</p>
<p>The NESCAC</p>
<p>Pac-10 imo.</p>
<p>ACC easily:
Duke, UVA, UNC, BC, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, Miami</p>
<p>Someone want to compute average SAT score of Pac 10 vs ACC using crude methods?</p>
<p>Big 11 has the highest out of the big athletic conferences, but ACC is the strongest top to bottom.</p>
<p>US News Rankings, collated by BCS conference membership</p>
<p>Big Ten:</p>
<p>NU - 12
Mich - 27
Ill - 39
Wisc - 39
PSU - 47
OSU - 53
PU - 61
Minn - 61
Ind - 71
MSU - 71
Iowa - 71</p>
<p>Pac Ten </p>
<p>Stan - 4
Cal - 21
UCLA - 24
USC - 26
Wash - 42
Ariz - 102
WSU - 106
Ore - 115
ASU - 121 </p>
<p>SEC </p>
<p>Vandy - 17
Fla - 47
Ga - 58
Aub - 88
Ala - 96
Tenn - 106
USC - 110
LSU - 128
Ark - 128
Ktcky - 128</p>
<p>Big 12 </p>
<p>Tex - 47
A&M - 61
Col - 77
Bay - 80
ISU - 88
Kan - 96
Neb - 96
Mo - 102
Oak - 102 </p>
<p>ACC </p>
<p>Duke - 10
Va - 24
UNC - 28
Wake - 28
BC - 34
Ga Tech - 35
Miami - 50
Maryl - 53
Clem - 61
Vtech - 71
NC ST - 88
FSU - 102</p>
<p>Big East</p>
<p>Pitt - 56
Cuse - 58
Rutg - 68
Conn - 66</p>
<p>Only the ACC and Big Ten have all their member’s ranked.</p>
<p>It doesn’t- major is a technical term.</p>
<p>Definitely Big 10</p>
<p>I guess the UAA isn’t really a “major” athletic conference:
UChicago, WUSTL, Emory, NYU, Case Western, CMU, Rochester, and Brandeis.</p>
<p>Big Ten, UAA, and ACC</p>
<p>The Ivy League isn’t a major athletic conference…</p>
<p>Pac 10 – Stanford and Berkeley – you can’t beat that.</p>
<p>Pac-10 IMO. Cal, Stanford, UCLA, USC and UW do enough heavy lifting for the rest of the conference. ACC would be another good one I guess, with Duke, UNC, UVA, Wake Forest and Georgia Tech.</p>
<p>If you did it by average us news rank, only the ACC and Big Ten could even qualify since having non ranked members would make the average plummet. Between the two of them, without actually doing the math, it seems the Big Ten wins for having higher overall average, even with fewer top flight institutions. </p>
<p>It’s also worth noting that the graduate reputations of many of the big ten’s schools, such as UW, UIUC, Minnesota and Iowa, are much better than their US news ranking indicates.</p>
<p>/big ten homer</p>
<p>
Yep. The ACC is the strongest. The Big 10 and PAC 10 are tied, but the Big 10 is overall a stronger conference.</p>
<ol>
<li>ACC</li>
<li>Big 10</li>
<li>PAC 10</li>
</ol>
<p>ACC vs. PAC 10
Duke (#10) < Stanford (#4)
UVA (#24) < Berkeley (#21)
Wake Forest (#28) < UCLA (#24)
UNC (#28) < USC (#26)
Boston College (#34) > Washington (#42)
Georgia Tech (#35) > Arizona (#102)
U Miami (#50) > Washington State (#106)
Maryland (#53) > Oregon (#115)
Clemson (#61) > Arizona State (#121)
Virginia Tech (#71) > Oregon State (Tier 3)</p>
<p>ACC: 6
PAC 10: 4
Winner: ACC</p>
<p>ACC vs. Big 10
Duke (#10) > Northwestern (#12)
UVA (#24) > Michigan (#27)
Wake Forest (#28) > Wisconsin (#39)
UNC (#28) > Illinois (#39)
Boston College (#34) > Penn State (#47)
Georgia Tech (#35) > Ohio State (#53)
U Miami (#50) > Minnesota (#61)
Maryland (#53) > Purdue (#61)
Clemson (#61) > Indiana (#71)
Virginia Tech (#71) = Iowa (#71)
NC State (#88) < Michigan State (#71)</p>
<p>ACC: 9
Big 10: 1
Tie: 1
Winner: ACC</p>
<p>PAC 10 vs. Big 10
Stanford (#4) > Northwestern (#12)
Berkeley (#21) > Michigan (#27)
UCLA (#24) > Wisconsin (#39)
USC (#26) > Illinois (#39)
Washington (#42) > Penn State (#47)
Arizona (#102) < Ohio State (#53)
Washington State (#106) < Minnesota (#61)
Oregon (#115) < Purdue (#61)
Arizona State (#121) < Indiana (#71)
Oregon State (Tier 3) < Iowa (#71)</p>
<p>PAC 10: 5
Big 10: 5
Winner: Tie</p>
<p>Note: While the NESCAC and UAA are academically strong, both are certainly not major athletic conferences.</p>
<p>NESCAC definately…</p>
<p>If someone is considering a comparison to IVY it is only NESCAC, best comparision, athletically and academically…</p>
<p>the others are like apples and oranges…</p>
<p>The NCAA conferences with the highest academic rankings, from top to bottom, would be the Ivy League, NESCAC, and UAA. These three conferences have similar athletic philosophies (e.g. no athletic scholarships) and a lot of application overlap – people who apply to Ivies commonly apply to NESCACs (like Willliams or Amherst) or UAAs (like Chicago or Northwestern) as well. So if the Ivy League is being named as a “smart” athletic conference, then it seems reasonable to suggest NESCAC and UAA too. </p>
<p>On the other hand, the question asked about “major” athletic conferences. There is no fixed definition of this term, but it probably does not include NESCAC or UAA, because they compete in NCAA Division III. </p>
<p>Of course, most people would not regard the Ivy League as a “major” conference either, even though the Ivies are in NCAA Division I. For example, the Ivy League would certainly not be regarded as a “major” conference in college football, since it competes in the FCS, rather than the FBS. And in college basketball, the term “major conference” generally refers to the ACC, Big East, Big 10, Big 12, Pac 10 and SEC – not the Ivy League. </p>
<p>So it’s not really clear what the Original Poster means by a phrase like “smartest major athletic conference after the Ivy League”. The Ivies aren’t usually regarded as a major athletic conference. The most comparable conferences to the Ivy League, in terms of both academic rankings and athletic philosophy, are probably NESCAC and UAA, which definitely aren’t “major” either.</p>
<p>^^ @IBClass06,</p>
<p>Why did you stop counting when you got to the really bad ACC schools? How can you possibly say the ACC is stronger than the Big Ten “top to bottom” when by far the two WORST schools in either conference—#88 NC State and #102 Florida State—are both ACC members? I’d say they’re roughly equal at the top (you can’t get much closer than #10 v. #12 and #24 v. #27), the ACC has a definite but not large edge in the middle (going by US News rankings which I generally have little trust in, but shelving that for the moment), and the Big Ten is clearly superior by a wide margin at the bottom. To my mind that makes the Big Ten the stronger conference “top to bottom.” The only way you make the ACC stronger is to ignore the ACC’s bottom bottom—but as they say, “the weakest link” and all that.</p>
<p>Besides, for academic purposes the Big Ten schools operate though an institutional alter ego, the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, which has a 12th member—Big Ten athletic conference co-founder and longstanding Big Ten member the University of Chicago. So on the academic side, including Chicago—which essentially decided to compete only on the academic level while continuing to cooperate academically with its Big Ten sister schools—the line-up goes like this:</p>
<h1>8 Chicago > #10 Duke</h1>
<h1>12 Northwestern > #24 UVA</h1>
<h1>27 Michigan > #28 UNC</h1>
<h1>37 Wisconsin < #28 Wake Forest</h1>
<h1>39 Illinois < #34 Boston College</h1>
<h1>47 Penn State < #35 Georgia Tech</h1>
<h1>53 Ohio State < #50 Miami</h1>
<h1>61 Minnesota < #53 Maryland</h1>
<h1>61 Purdue = #61 Clemson</h1>
<h1>71 Indiana = #71 Virginia Tech</h1>
<h1>71 Iowa > #88 NC State</h1>
<h1>71 Michigan State > #102 Florida State (by a huge margin)</h1>
<p>“Top to bottom,” then, the Big Ten/CIC is clearly stronger.</p>
<p>Same for the Pac 10, by the way. The only way you get to say it’s stronger as a conference is if you turn a blind eye to the truly mediocre schools at its bottom. On average and “top to bottom,” the Pac 10 is clearly weaker than both the Big Ten and the ACC, even though it’s stronger at the very top.</p>