I have a confession to make: I’m a bit of an SEC homer. While some of my colleagues at The Daily have felt some disillusionment towards Southeastern football, I don’t think you can deny the conference’s massive presence and its transcendent role in football.

However, I am a Stanford student and coming into this season, I thought the Pac-12 would break through as the undisputed top conference in the nation. Things haven’t been as smooth for the Pac as I anticipated, especially for the top dogs — UCLA struggled against Virginia, Stanford lost to USC and Wazzu gave Oregon fits at Autzen.

Nevertheless, football out west is still something to be reckoned with and I thought it would be a fun exercise to see how the two conferences would match up in a head-to-head challenge style format, matching up teams by their position in their respective league. The one complication is that the SEC has 14 teams while the Pac-12 has —shockingly —12. To resolve this issue I decided to drop the bottom two teams in the SEC, Arkansas and Vanderbilt (we still love you, Derek Mason).

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So, without further ado, let’s go. (Disclaimer, these are my own picks and I know nothing about football):

Alabama-Oregon: Alabama

This is the game we’ve all been drooling over in our dreams (or maybe that’s just me). Speed vs. Power. Crimson and white vs. a fever dream of forest green and highlighter yellow.

I really don’t know whom to pick in this situation given Alabama’s slightly shaky quarterback position and Oregon’s trouble down in the trenches. Marcus Mariota will surely do his thing and turn some heads across the country, but I just can’t envision a scenario where TJ Yeldon doesn’t run wild over the Ducks defense.

Auburn-UCLA: UCLA

Using the AP poll as our standard for determining matchups, this is next in line. With UCLA’s shaky start to the season, Brett Hundley’s injury and my deep mistrust of Jim Mora doing anything with talent (I’m a Falcons fan…), I was going to pick the Tigers, but the Bruins’ whopping 62 points on Arizona State have me reconsidering. This game would definitely be a tight one, but I can’t help but think that Auburn ran out of stardust during last year’s run.

Texas A&M-Stanford: Stanford

Probably my favorite matchup in this challenge. An unstoppable offense vs. an incredible defense in a classic matchup and a porous defense against an endzone-phobic offense on the other side. Kenny Hill would test the Stanford secondary in a way no team has all season, but — through four games — I don’t feel comfortable betting against the Cardinal defense to get the job done. Stanford takes it in a close one.

USC-Ole Miss: Ole Miss

This is an intriguing game as well. USC did not look great against Stanford and shot themselves in the foot against Boston College a week later. The Trojans didn’t look any better against Oregon State. We’ll learn a lot about quarterback Bo Wallace and Rebels this Saturday when they host Alabama, but if this game were to be played right now, I don’t think USC would do enough to win.

Arizona State-Mississippi State: Miss. State

Dan Mullen’s squad is quietly closing in on the top-10. Arizona State is fading fast after a blowout loss to UCLA. The Bulldogs are having a season to remember and I think they take this one. More cowbell.

Arizona-Georgia: Georgia

Georgia has Todd Gurley. Arizona does not. I rest my case.

Washington-LSU: LSU

LSU hasn’t done a lot to impress so far in 2014, but Washington is a program in transition with a new head coach and this is a tough draw for the Huskies. The Bayou Bengals take this one, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Washington gave them a good fight.

Oregon St.-Missouri: Missouri

The defending SEC champions are still a force to be reckoned with. Sean Mannion keeps his team in the game, but the loss of Brandin Cooks would really hurt the Beavers in a game like this. Mizzou takes this one.

Cal-South Carolina: South Carolina

Cal has made major strides from just a season ago and earned a big nonconference win over Northwestern. South Carolina, however, is in a different weight class and might be too much for the Bears at this point.

Utah-Florida: Utah

The first Pac-12 beat down in this challenge. Utah may be one of the lower ranked teams in the conference, but I guarantee that they will sneak up on someone this season like they did on Stanford a year ago. They’re just too good not to. As for Florida, that national championship feels so long ago. The Utes take this one in a battle between former Urban Meyer schools.

Washington State-Kentucky: Washington State

Don’t underestimate the job Mike Leach has done in Pullman. This team may be a Pac-12 cellar dweller, but they can play with the best on any given Saturday. Just ask Oregon or Auburn from last season. The Cougars take care of business against Kentucky.

Colorado-Tennessee: Tennessee

This may not be the one we’ve all been waiting for, but Colorado vs. Tennessee would be an interesting game. Butch Jones is leading the Vols back towards relevance and Tennessee’s strong showing against Georgia leads me to think that they’re playing well enough to handle the Buffs.

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Overall, the SEC wins this hypothetical challenge by a score of 8-4; however, this doesn’t take away too much from the Pac-12, which is still, in my opinion, the deeper conference from top to bottom (although not including Vanderbilt really helped the SEC).

This test is by no means conclusive, but I do think the number of incredible matchups we see here suggests that these are the two best conferences in the country and it would be great if this actually came to fruition.

Larry Scott, Mike Slive—make this happen. Sparks would certainly fly.

Vihan Lakshman once called in to a radio show to talk about how ” ‘dem west-coast boys won’t win four games with their shoddy defense, PAWWWL.” To find out what his caller ID was, contact him at vihan ‘at’ stanford.edu