Golden Nuggets: Pac-12 Division Announcement, Cal and Stanford Join the North

This morning at 11:30 am Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott announced the breakdown of the Pac-12 into North and South divisions.  In addition, he provided information on rival games, the championship game, and revenue.

Here are the main points from the press conference: 

• Revenue will be equally shared except in years when total revenue is below $170 million, in which case UCLA and USC will each receive an extra $2 million.
• Cal and Stanford will join Washington, Washington State, Oregon, and Oregon State in the Pac-12 North Division.
• 9-game schedule with 4 cross-divisional games per year.  Cal and Stanford will play USC and UCLA every year.  ASU, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado will rotate through the Bay Area teams' schedules.
• Pac-12 Championship Game will be a home game for the team with the best conference record. Head-to-head will decide the home game in the event of a tie.  USC does not qualify while they have a post-season ban.
• Non-football sports will not be placed in divisions.
• Basketball will play home-and-homes with traditional rivals and home-and-homes with six rotating teams.  They will play the remaining four teams only once in the season, for a total of 18 games.
• No decision has been reached about whether Cal @ Colorado 2011 will be a conference game or not.

After the jump we have business as usual featuring score/attendance predictions, Q+A with ASU media outlets, Genyk's update on changes to special teams strategies, and a look at how the incoming freshman are doing at basketball's practices.

Prediction Thursday

• Ted Miller predicts another Cal victory (he always picks us in these toss-ups).

California 28, Arizona State 27: Anyone else struggling to get a feel for this one? I would not touch this game in Vegas. Both teams have plenty of talent. The Sun Devils showed something by winning at Washington and have had an extra week to prepare. But Cal is a different team at home. And wouldn't it be just like the Bears to come out sharp? Any final number here wouldn't surprise me, including a blowout either way. By the way, I just switched the teams and kept the score and may do it again. When you're not looking.

• Two of Yahoo/Rivals' four writers and 79% of their readers pick Cal to win.
• Wilner predicts something.  I don't know what because he hasn't yet finished this article.

Attendance Prediction:

Last time (against UCLA) I predicted 68,588 and once again the estimate was high because turnout was only 61,664.  This is turning out to be one of the worst years for attendance in the Tedford era.

This week's numbers are 56,295.91, 57,172.90, 57,218.34 and 58,398.98.  Since attendance has been low this year, let's take the lowest estimate and guess that 56,295.91 will show up.  Once again, I will not be surprised if this is an overestimate, especially if the rain keeps fans at home.

Football

• BearTerritory.net has a Q and A with ASUDevils.com publisher Chris Karpman.  The ASU defense has been excellent this year, but mistakes on both offense and defense have made mistakes that prevent them from making the most of their opportunities.  Karpman says this team isn't far from being 6-0.
• Both programs desperately need a win on Saturday and each team is mentioned in Ted Miller's "What to Watch."
• Cal's defense and Jeff Tedford's stock are both falling this week.
• After Wednesday's practice Tedford said Steve Williams will see more playing time at cornerback in future weeks.  Also, Anthony Miller's lack of production mostly stems from defenses keying in on him and keeping him tightly covered, according to Tedford.
• Jeff Genyk says the special teams units must tackle better to take advantage of Giorgio Tavecchio's much-improved kickoffs.  Ross has made some changes that will prevent him from fielding punts at poor field position (inside the 10, especially).
• A sense of urgency is rising among the players because they are running out of  opportunities to show that Cal is a good football team.
• Phil Steele's mid-season All-American team features Mike Mohamed on the third team.  His All-Pac-10 team includes Mike Mohamed and Mitchell Schwartz on the first team, Justin Cheadle, Cameron Jordan, and Mychal Kendricks on the second team, and Marvin Jones, Chris Guarnero, Darian Hagan, Chris Conte, and Bryan Anger on the third team.
• Mike Mohamed is a quarterfinalist for the Lott Trophy.