The Los Angeles Times’ Chris Dufresne cites respected college football analyst Phil Steele who recently put forth that the eight toughest 2007 schedules are those of Pac-10 teams, and the 6 toughest 2006 schedules were those of Pac-10 squads Stanford, USC, Washington, Arizona, UCLA and Oregon (with the SEC checking in with Tennessee 7th and LSU at 50th).  But according to Pac-10 chief Tom Hanson, it’s not enough to play tough non-conference schedules, it’s “very, very important” that Pac-10 teams win their big games this season to earn national respect.  Those pivotal 2007 nonconference games include Tennessee at Cal (9/1), Notre Dame at UCLA (10/6), Washington State at Wisconsin (9/1), Oregon at Michigan (9/8), and Washington’s playing host to Boise State (9/8) and Ohio State (9/15) in consecutive weeks.

As Oregon coach Mike Belotti stressed, Cal had a great season in 2006, but its collapse at Tennessee to start the season “colored everything that happened the rest of the year,” in terms of the Pac-10 perception. Of course, USC will be playing at Notre Dame and Nebraska, but according to Dufresne,

The Pac-10’s national image will change only when teams other than USC start making national noise.

Pac-10’s assignment is to go the extra mile in ‘07 (LA Times)