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It’s a simple fact that football games are won by teams with the most standout players, and this year’s NFL draft backs up that claim when it comes to the Pac-12.

Experts often say that a team cannot reach the Final Four of the NCAA basketball tournament without at least one future first-round NBA draft choice on the team, and having two or three almost guarantees a trip to the national semifinals.

Although a parallel argument is not often made for college football, where many more players are involved in success, the logic is the same.

It’s no coincidence that national champion LSU had the most 2020 draft picks with 14, tying a record for the most selections by a school. Ohio State, one of the four teams in the College Football playoff, was tied for second with 10 drafted players.

And so it is with the Pac-12, as indicated by this year's draft choices from the conference. 

The draft is an even better barometer of team strength when the round in which a player is drafted is considered. So we decided to include that factor in our measurement by creating a point system for the Pac-12 teams: 7 points for a player selected in the first round, 6 for a second-round pick and so on until a single point is awarded for a seventh-round pick.

This is how did it worked out for the Pac-12, with teams listed in order of draft points:

1. Utah – 28 points (7 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 8-1 (tied for best), Pac-12 South champ. Overall: 11-3 overall.

2. Oregon – 16 points (4 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 8-1 (tied for best), Pac-12 North and conference champion. Overall: 12-2

3 (tied). USC – 13 points (2 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 7-2 (third-best). Overall: 8-5

3 (tied). UCLA – 13 points (4 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 4-5 (tied for fourth best). Overall: 4-8

5. Colorado – 12 points (3 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 3-6 (tied for ninth place). Overall: 5-7

6. Cal – 11 points (3 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 4-5 (tied for fourth-best). Overall: 8-5

7. Arizona State – 8 points (2 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 4-5 (tied for fourth-best). Overall: 8-5.

8. (tied). Washington – 7 points (2 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 4-5 (tied for fourth best). Overall: 8-5.

8. (tied). Stanford – 7 points (2 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 3-6 (tied for ninth place). Overall: 4-8

10. Oregon State – 6 points (3 players drafted). Pac-12 finish: 4-5 (tied for fourth-best). Overall 5-7

11. Washington State – 2 points (1 player drafted). Pac-12 finish: 3-6 (tied for ninth place). Overall: 6-7

12. Arizona – 0 points (no one drafted). Pac-12 finish: 2-7 (last place). Overall: 4-8

As you can see, how well a team did in the 2020 draft corresponds almost perfectly with how the team finished in the Pac-12 in 2019. Colorado is the only real outlier, but you will note that the Buffaloes beat Arizona State and Washington and held a 10-point, fourth-quarter lead on USC before losing. Colorado did enough to get its coach, Mel Tucker, hired by Michigan State.

The only problem with these numbers as a formula is that draft success only measures a team’s strength in retrospect. So it's just a nice little indicator for folks (like me) who enjoy noting what numbers reveal.

How do we explain the fact that Cal’s promising 2018 team, which finished 7-6, including wins over USC and nationally ranked Washington, did not produce a single player who was taken in the 2019 NFL draft? Maybe we should look at the fact that three Cal players who signed as free agents (Jordan Kunaszyk, Patrick Laird, Patrick Mekari) made NFL rosters in 2019, and two of them (Laird and Mekari) started NFL games as rookies.

So which Cal players will be taken in the 2021 draft? USC and Oregon each has a player projected by Bleacher Report to be taken in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft, and Stanford has two potential first-rounders. The 247 early mock draft for 2021 also has two Stanford players and one each from USC and Oregon going in the the first round, while The Draft Network has two Stanford players (Walker Little, Paulson Adebo) and one from Oregon (Penei Sewell) going in the first round. Cal has no first-round selections in any of the three mock drafts. 

Those projections suggest Stanford might be better than expected.  

The Bears have high hopes for the 2020 season (assuming the 2020 season is played), as Justin Wilcox notes in the video below, shot after the Redbox Bowl win over Illinois.

There is one interesting aside to the NFL draft as it relates to the Pac-12: Neither Utah's Tyler Huntley nor Washington State's Anthony Gordon, who were the first-team and second-team all-Pac-12 quarterbacks for 2019, were selected in the 2020 NFL draft, but Oregon's Justin Herbert, who not a first- or second-team all-conference selection in either 2018 or 2019, was the No. 6 overall draft pick this year.