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The SEC is routing the Big Ten in college football ratings. That was the case last year, when at least one SEC team played in four of the top six-rated games of the regular season, and 18 of the top 25. And it’s grown this year: An SEC team has played in nine of the top 10, and 22 of the top 25 highest-rated games. The vast majority of those are SEC versus SEC games.

The Big Ten, meanwhile, has just three of its conference games on that list, and its only two appearances in the top 10 came in games against SEC teams.

there may be no better example of the SEC’s (television) superiority than what happened on Oct. 11: The Big Ten had a top-10 game, then-No. 7 Indiana going to then-No. 2 Oregon. It was on CBS at 3:30 p.m., and it was a close game until Indiana pulled away in the final minutes for a 30-20 win.

And yet the game still only drew 5.6 million viewers and was outdrawn by three SEC games that day: Texas-Oklahoma (8.7 million), Alabama-Missouri (7 million) and Georgia-Auburn (6.7 million).

And just two weeks ago, the top-15 matchup between 9-1 Oregon and 8-2 USC was beaten in the same time slot by 7-3 Texas against 2-8 Arkansas.

This is a more recent trend. From 2021 through 2023, ratings among the leagues were almost equal. In games with at least 3.5 million viewers, 128 involved at least one team from the currently constructed SEC, while 127 included at least one team from the current Big Ten. Highly rated games grew from 72 with at least 3.5 million viewers in 2021-22 season to 80 in 2023-24, according to SportsMediaWatch.com. This year, before the regular-season finale numbers have been announced, 70 regular-season games have hit that number, with 39 involving the SEC and 24 the Big Ten.

Six different SEC schools have played in games that drew at least 10 million viewers. Ohio State was the only Big Ten team to do that, and it was against an SEC team (Texas).

The SEC has more good teams and brands. The Big Ten is top-heavy: It has won the last two national titles, and has three top-10 teams, but so does the SEC, which has eight ranked teams (as of this week) and unranked big brands like LSU, Auburn and Florida. Even the likes of South Carolina and Kentucky have managed to play competitive games against good teams.

More than half (57 percent) of SEC games this year have been decided by one possession, and the average margin of victory in SEC games this year is 11.4 points, about 3 points closer than last year.

“The conference is playing at a super high level with lots of teams that are competitive, lots of games that are going into the fourth quarter,” said John Kosner, a former executive with ESPN, CBS and the NBA who now runs a consulting firm.” You don’t have that on the bottom rung of the Big Ten. Now you have a lot of teams that just don’t generate a lot of national attention and don’t have a natural rivalry game either, that people really care about.”...

In the last rounds of expansion, the SEC added the Oklahoma-Texas game, brought back the Texas-Texas A&M rivalry, as well as geographic rivalries that Oklahoma and Texas had with other border-state programs: LSU, Missouri and Arkansas.

“Rivalry games are really good for TV,” Kosner said, pointing out that Georgia-Florida was still the highest-rated game that day (7.9 million), beating out Ohio State-Penn State (7.19 million), which was in the “Big Noon” slot.

The Big Ten expansion did import USC-UCLA and Oregon-Washington. But creating a coast-to-coast conference also set up some unfamiliar matchups, such as anytime the four West Coast schools played against any non-brand teams. Or even when they’re brand teams: Ohio State’s game at Washington — which was in the national championship two seasons ago — was the CBS 3:30 p.m. game on Sept. 27, drew 5.23 million viewers, and was outdrawn by two SEC games the same day.

Next up is a big part of the problem.

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The Big Ten’s football scheduling mirrors what commissioner Tony Petitti did as deputy commissioner with Major League Baseball when he chose to trim divisional rivalry games in favor of every team playing every other opponent. At the top, it’s great to see the Boston Red Sox play the Chicago Cubs and the New York Yankees face the Los Angeles Dodgers. But what about the Pittsburgh Pirates playing the A’s and the Tampa Bay Rays meeting the San Diego Padres? That’s kind of the case here.

There were plenty of comfortable, second-tier neighborly series that resonated with fans through divisional play that are no longer annual. Some were ratings winners like Michigan-Penn State and Michigan State-Ohio State and others were important regionally like Nebraska-Wisconsin or Illinois-Iowa. But there was a sizzle and rivalry factor. It helps to get Oregon-Penn State (8.5 million) and Ohio State-Washington (5.2 million), but in a coast-to-coast league, regionality no longer is a positive, which it still is for the SEC.

Petitti also worked in the NBA. He has no college football experience as opposed to Stankey who is college football guy. Hence his push to expand CFP to 24 teams, get rid of rivalries, and make college football like the NBA with bad ratings but everyone with a pulse gets in the playoffs

Petitti also screwed up the tv contracts;

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The SEC decided to go all-in with one place: Disney, meaning ABC, ESPN and the SEC Network, all are under the same umbrella. The Big Ten made deals with Fox, CBS and NBC, and made more money that way. But it may have handed the SEC and Disney a couple of big advantages.

Self-promotion is the obvious one: SEC games are promoted not only throughout the week and Saturday morning’s “College GameDay,” but on every SEC game broadcast, because they’re all under the same corporate umbrella. The Big Ten, meanwhile, has a situation where Fox, CBS and NBC are still competing with each other, so any promotion of games on other networks may come with less enthusiasm.

But the more important factor may be what TV executives call “audience flow.” By having one company make all decisions, SEC games have a general strategy: the noon game leads to the 3:30 p.m. game, which leads to the night game. And with a few other games parceled out to ESPN2 and the SEC Network.

The Big Ten has a more bifurcated approach, each of the three networks angling for the best games and not as much strategy.

Then there is the matter of that big noon kickoff:

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For generations, Big Ten fans viewed the 3:30 p.m. ET window as the gold standard and noon ET was second tier. Fox, which has first-tier rights and owns 61 percent of BTN, has turned noon into its signature kickoff time. But it can’t air any West Coast games in that time slot. So it forfeited matchups like Michigan at USC or Indiana at Oregon. So Fox has leaned into flagship programs Ohio State and Michigan to carry that time slot, which irritates fans who prefer late afternoon or night kickoffs because those atmospheres are exciting.

I predict the Big 10 will eventually break up. Petitti is going to get himself run out while more and more problems develop.