College Football Preview Part XXII- Big 12

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Welcome Back!

Today I continue my conference previews. These previews will attempt to predict how each conference finishes, but realize that doing so is extremely difficult, especially since no conference has a balanced schedule. Also, whatever the conferences come up with in the form of tiebreakers will make a huge difference, as all but the Sun Belt have done away with divisions. In addition, these predictions aren't my personal opinion; they are the result of the formula/model/statistical analysis/whatever. I will sometimes mention my thoughts in the narratives below the predictions.

The list of records for 3-years, 6-years, and 10 years are conference records only, and do not include any results for the conference championship games. You will notice that the teams haven't all played the same number of games, especially when considering they should have. This is because that teams played a varied number of games in 2020, and that sometimes games get cancelled (see Virginia in 2022, for example). In the case of teams switching conferences, I counted the record from their previous conference. Independent teams joining a conference were counted with their full record (UMass), but FCS teams moving up enter with 0-0 records.

In case you are interested, I get all of my information from various sources. I use the 3 main preview magazines (Phil Steele, Lindy's, and Athlon), but I also use many different websites, including (but not limited to): Google, Winsipedia, sports-reference.com, ESPN.com, TeamRankings.com, NCAA.com, and, of course, individual school websites.

I don't have a staff- it's just me- so all of the research is my own from these various sources (it doesn't help when they contradict each other...), so any mistakes are mine. I also don't have an editor/proofreader, so you are likely to find several (many? I hope not) typos, such as commas where periods should be (or vice versa), a misspelled or missing word, doubled words ("the the" in the middle of a sentence, for example), etc. 

Finally, feel free to leave a comment. Interacting is much of the fun! Of course, if you know me personally, feel free to just text. I'll get that a lot quicker.

So, on with the previews!


Big 12


3-Year History


Kan St 18-9/.667/1st

TCU 18-9/.667/1st

Texas Tech 16-11/.593/3rd

BYU 17-14/.548/4th

Utah 14-13/.519/5th

WVU 14-13/.519/5th

Iowa St 14-13/.519/5th

Baylor 12-15/.444/8th

Arizona 12-15/.444/8th

Kansas 12-15/.444/8th

UCF 11-15/.423/11th

Okla St 11-16/.407/12th

Ariz St 11-16/.407/12th

Cincinnati 10-16/.385/14th

Houston 10-16/.385/14th

Colo 9-18/.333/16th


6-Year History


Utah 33-17/.660/1st

BYU 45-24/.652/2nd

Cincy 31-17/.646/3rd

ISU 32-22/.593/4th

KSU 31-23/.574/5th

Okla St 30-24/.556/6th

UCF 27-23/.540/7th

TCU 29-25/.537/8th

Bay 29-25/.537/8th

Houston 23-25/.479/10th

WVU 25-28/.472/11th

ASU 23-26/.469/12th

TTU 24-30/.444/13th

Colo 18-31/.367/14th

Ariz 15-35/.300/15th

Kansas 14-39/.269/16th


10-Year History


Utah 53-33/.616/1st

BYU 74-47/.612/2nd

OSU 53-37/.589/3rd

UCF 47-35/.573/4th

TCU 51-39/.567/5th

Houston 45-35/.563/6th

Cincy 44-36/.550/7th

KSU 48-42/.533/8th

WVU 47-42/.528/9th

ISU 47-43/.522/10th

Baylor 43-47/.478/11th

ASU 40-45/.471/12th

TTU 37-53/.411/13th

Colo 31-54/.365/14th

Ariz 28-58/.326/15th

Kansas 16-73/.180/16th


Predicted Finish:


  1. Kansas State

  2. BYU

  3. Iowa State

  4. Arizona State

  5. Baylor

  6. Utah

  7. TCU

  8. Texas Tech

  9. Cincinnati

  10. Kansas

  11. Colorado

  12. West Virginia

  13. Houston

  14. UCF

  15. Oklahoma State

  16. Arizona


Conference Champion: Kansas State


Chances to make the playoff: Guaranteed. The winner of the Big 12 CG is almost always going to be one of the 5 highest rated champions, and so will be awarded an automatic berth. The real question is whether the conference can get an at-large team in the CFP. Last year had so much parity at the top that it would have been impossible to sort out which of 3 remaining teams would have been most deserving, and the same thing may happen again this year.

Don’t be surprised if… BYU actually does finish in the top 3 or 4 spots. I realize a lot of people have written them off because of the QB situation, but I think they'll be fine, as they have one of the easiest schedules in the conference.

I’m not convinced… Houston will finish in the bottom 4. I expect them to be at least in the 9-12 range, and maybe even in the top half.


Make sure you come back tomorrow as I continue my previews!


Until next time, may you and your loved ones be blessed!   

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