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SALT LAKE CITY — The road back to the Pac-12 championship game for Utah got more difficult this summer.
In an effort to enhance the competitive nature of the conference and increase the likelihood that the winner of the Pac-12 title game could make the four-team playoff off another quality win, the conference eliminated divisions and decided to feature the top two teams in its championship game.
While it makes sense on the surface, it's made for a more difficult path for teams to get to the title game — and for good reason. No longer does a team have to just be better than the five other teams in its division — regardless of how strong or weak it may be on a given year — it has to be better than 10 other teams.
The one complication is that the Pac-12 remains on a cross-divisional schedule that rotates each season, so some teams may have an easier path than others until at least 2024 when UCLA and USC leave to the Big Ten. As a result, it's led to some confusion in the Pac-12's tiebreaker rules as fans attempt to project their team's chances.
So with that context in mind, let's take a look at Utah's chances of returning to the Pac-12 title game — potentially its fourth in five seasons.
As of this writing, it appears to be a four-team race — Oregon, UCLA, USC and Utah — though there could be a path for a couple other teams. That would only happen if all the top teams go on an uncharacteristic losing streak. Possible, just not very likely.
If you don't care about all the nuances to the various tiebreakers and such, the short answer for the Utes is that they control their own destiny (almost certainly).
(A helpful graphic can also be viewed at the bottom of this article to help you visualize all this.)
For those that want to get into the thick of it, let's dive in.
To start, Utah has to win out for a (mostly) guaranteed spot in the title game. The Utes are favored in three of their final four games — Arizona (94.4%), Stanford (91.5%) and Colorado (96.7%) — but have a 46.5% chance of beating Oregon, according to ESPN. Lose in any of the four remaining games and all that's left for Utah is a prayer at chaos — not likely.
For the sake of this article, we'll assume that Utah wins out and chaos hasn't unfolded in the conference (meaning all favored teams win the games they're supposed to win). While all of this is not necessarily likely, it's the best way to illustrate Utah's path to the championship game.
Utah's path also likely varies based on the winner of the UCLA-USC rivalry game — talk about high stakes for a rivalry game — which happens to be played on the same day the Utes travel to Eugene to battle it out with the Ducks. We'll look at the various scenarios based on the winner of the crosstown rivalry matchup.
If USC wins ...
Once again, we're going to assume that USC doesn't lose for the rest of the season (they're favored in every one of their final three games of conference play) and that Oregon doesn't lose any other games outside of its matchup with Utah. This means Oregon, USC and Utah all end the regular season with an 8-1 record, and the multi-team tiebreaker takes effect.
Since Oregon and USC will not meet this season, no head-to-head matchup can be determined, which means the tiebreaker moves to the teams' "winning percentage against common conference opponents." To avoid getting too far in the weeds, Oregon and USC pull away from Utah with 6-0 records, while Utah stays put with a 5-1 record (a loss to UCLA).
Many have interpreted the tiebreaker as such that this is where the championship game is settled because only two teams remain. But a Pac-12 official confirmed to KSL.com that the tiebreaker plays out until one team is isolated and determined as the No. 1 seed. At that point, any remaining teams go through the tiebreaker again until a second team is identified.
As such, Oregon and USC now move to the two-team tiebreaker, which determines the "win percentage against next highest place common opponent in the standings," which would be Utah — they remain tied with an 0-1 record. It would then move to "combined win percentage in conference games of conference opponents."
As mentioned above, we'll assume that every favored team won its game, which means Oregon's opponents would have a combined 35-46 record and USC's opponents would have a combined 32-49 record.
Oregon advances to the Pac-12 championship game as the No. 1 seed and USC goes back into the pool with Utah, at which time Utah wins the head-to-head criteria and the Utes claim the No. 2 seed. This result is the same if USC's combined opponent record is better than Oregon's at the end of the season since Utah would own the head-to-head tiebreaker over both teams.
If UCLA wins ...
This is where it gets a little more tricky, so buckle up.
In this scenario, UCLA beats USC and doesn't drop any other games (the Bruins are favored in all remaining games except against the Trojans) and the same rules apply to Oregon as above. Oregon, UCLA and Utah end the season with an 8-1 record, and the multi-team tiebreaker comes into play.
There is a head-to-head scenario here, but it's a wash since Oregon beat UCLA, UCLA beat Utah, and Utah beat Oregon. The three teams all would have a 3-0 record against common conference opponents, which means it moves to the teams' record against the "next-highest-placed common opponent in the standings."
The three teams don't share a lot of common opponents, but the ones they do share are teams ranked at the bottom of the conference and are assumed to have lost to these teams to be in this position — we have a tie again. So we get back to the "combined win percentage in conference games of conference opponents" tiebreaker method.
As mentioned above, we'll (again) assume that every favored team won its game, which means Oregon's opponents would have a combined 36-45 record, UCLA's opponents would have a combined 37-44 record, and Utah's opponents would have a combined 38-43 record.
Utah advances to the Pac-12 championship game as the No. 1 seed and Oregon and UCLA go back into a two-team tiebreaker, at which time Oregon wins the head-to-head criteria and the Ducks claim the No. 2 seed.
This result can have some variance if some favored teams lose and shift the opponent records. If Oregon wins out on the opponent record tiebreaker, they'd meet up with UCLA in the championship game — the Bruins own the head-to-head tiebreaker over the Utes; if UCLA wins out on the opponent record tiebreaker, they'd meet up with Utah in the championship game — the Utes own the head-to-head tiebreaker over the Ducks.
Clear as mud?
There are a lot of games left to be played in the regular season, which means all of this can change, but it at least provides a blueprint to help understand the Pac-12's tiebreaker rules. If you need a simple (is that possible in this?) flowchart to help you understand it, one is included below.
Good luck!
Click on the graphic below to enlarge and see the different scenarios for the Pac-12 title game.
