Phil Steele.

[The Ancient Enemy]

In his annual preview (on pages 18-19), Phil Steele provides his assessment of the nation's toughest conferences. As usual, the Pac-10 isn't ranked up there with the big boys:

01 - SEC
02 - Big 12
03 - Big 10
04 - ACC
05 - Pac-10
06 - Big East
07 - Mt. West
08 - CUSA
09 - WAC
10 - MAC
11 - Independents
12 - Sun Belt

But, later (on page 318), Steele comes up with his list of the teams with the most difficult schedules in the nation, and there's a Pac-10, front and center. (While Steele lists all 119 teams, here's the first 50):

01 - Southern Cal
02 - Stanford
03 - Washington
04 - UCLA
05 - Oregon
06 - Washington State
07 - Notre Dame
08 - Iowa State
09 - Tennessee
10 - California
11 - Arizona
12 - Oregon State
13 - Colorado
14 - Oklahoma
15 - Michigan State
16 - Duke
17 - Ohio State
18 - Northwestern
19 - Baylor
20 - Arizona State
21 - Michigan
22 - Minnesota
23 - North Carolina
24 - Indiana
25 - Virginia
26 - Texas Tech.
27 - Penn State
28 - Nebraska
29 - North Carolina State
30 - Georgia Tech.
31 - Mississippi
32 - LSU
33 - Florida
34 - Air Force
35 - Syracuse
36 - Rice
37 - Mississippi State
38 - Texas
39 - Oklahoma State
40 - Iowa
41 - Kansas State
42 - Maryland
43 - Cincinnati
44 - Florida State
45 - Illinois
46 - Missouri
47 - Kentucky
48 - Georgia
49 - Vanderbilt
50 - Miami

Just another one-man system that has flaws.