There’s not a league in college football quite like the Big 12. On any given Saturday, the top team in the league could play the cellar-dweller of the conference and you just might have yourself an upset.
Some conferences claim to have depth or parity unlike anything fans will find anywhere else, but the Big 12 has the data to back up the claims: this league is drunk every single weekend.
Counting the aftermath of Week 9, we’ve seen a total of 39 conference games, and very rarely have we seen a line hit double digits.
Utah (4-4, 1-4) and Oklahoma State (3-5, 0-9) — two of the top three teams in the Big 12 Preseason Media Poll — are a combined 1-9 in league play and are already out of the conference title race.
Meanwhile, BYU (8-0) — who was picked to finish 13th in the preseason — is a perfect 5-0 in Big 12 play and has ascended to the No. 9 team in the nation after a red-hot start.
If there’s one thing that we’ve learned this season, it’s that it’s almost better to be an underdog than a favorite in the Big 12. After taking a look at the data through the first several weeks of conference play, the data actually suggests that is the case, too.
In 39 conference games, Big 12 underdogs are a combined 24-15 against the spread and an astonishing 18-21 straight up.
Here’s a look at every upset so far, as well as how many points each underdog was getting.
- UCF 35, TCU 34 | TCU (-2.5)
- UTAH 22, OSU 19 | OSU (-1.0)
- BYU 38, KSU 9 | KSU (-7.5)
- ARIZ 23, UTAH 10 | UTAH (-9.5)
- BYU 34, BAY 28 | BAY (-3.5)
- TCU 38, KU 27 | KU (-1.5)
- COLO 48, UCF 21 | UCF (-15)
- UH 30, TCU 19 | TCU (-16.5)
- WVU 38, OSU 14 | OSU (-2.5)
- TTU 28, ARIZ 22 | AZ (-5.5)
- ASU 27, UTAH 19 | UTAH (-5.5)
- CIN 19, UCF 13 | UCF (-2.5)
- COLO 34, ARIZ 7 | ARIZ (-2.5)
- BAY 59, TTU 35 | TTU (-4.5)
- TCU 13, UTAH 7 | UTAH (-5.5)
- BYU 37, UCF 24 | UCF (-2.5)
- WVU 31, ARIZ 26 | ARIZ (-5.5)
- HOU 17, UTAH 14 | UTAH (-4.5)
We’ve seen multiple upsets in this league in every week through conference play, and that’s showing no signs of stopping either.
There are five games on the docket this weekend, and if the data remains consistent, we should see at least two outright upsets, and three of the five underdogs cover the line.
That would sound ridiculous in any other league, but not in the Big 12 — that’s just how things shake out.
