Joel Klatt Makes Surprising Choice For College Football’s Most Competitive Conference

We’re in a new era of college football that’s shed one of its Power Five conferences and expanded to a twelve-team playoff format. That comes with a change in the balance of power for the remaining Big Ten, Big 12, SEC, and ACC conferences. The Big Ten and the SEC dominated the preseason AP poll landing a combined eight teams in the top ten.

The ACC at least had the Florida State Seminoles ranked No. 10 overall, as the Big 12 was completely absent from the top ten. While they might not have any programs ranked among the nation’s best in the preseason poll, Fox college football analyst Joel Klatt still believes the Big 12 will be the most competitive conference in the country.

He says that in the context of how competitive these teams will be against each other within the conference, not necessarily against some of the elite college football programs.

“Now, are all of these teams better than the best teams in the Big Ten or the SEC?” Klatt said on Monday’s episode of "The Joel Klatt Show." “No, probably not. But when you’re just talking about competitive balance, this is the most competitive conference in the country.”

The Utah Utes come in as the highest-ranked Big 12 team in the preseason at No. 12 overall, but Klatt says there is no true consensus on which team will represent the conference in the College Football Playoff after winning the Big 12 title game.

“We will see the winner of this conference in the Playoff with a bye, incredible!” Klatt said. “So, now we’ve got this gauntlet conference that might be as deep as any–might be deeper than any.”

The Utes are the betting favorite to win the conference, but Klatt says the Kansas State Wildcats, the Arizona Wildcats, the Kansas Jayhawks, and the Oklahoma State Cowboys are all hot on their heels to snatch that crown.

Related: Greg McElroy Names Two Top 10 Programs That Could Fail To Meet Preseason Expectations