Mike Sorensen: Will Utes follow BYU's lead and make a change at offensive coordinator?

Published: Sunday, Jan. 6 2013 5:00 p.m. MST

Several times in recent years, the winner of the ESPN Bowl Challenge Cup was the Mountain West Conference, which had the best bowl record four times between 2005 and 2011. Only one other conference had more than one win in the decade beginning in 2002 — the ACC with two.

Things have changed since Utah and BYU left the conference. This year the MWC had the worst bowl record among the 11 FBS conferences at 1-4.

The best? Conference USA with a 4-1 mark, thanks to upset wins by SMU, Rice and Tulsa along with a victory by favored UCF.

And what about the WAC, which was 2-0? Conferences need to play at least three bowl games to win the Challenge Cup and the WAC could have had three, except that Louisiana Tech was left out in the cold after trying to hold out for a bigger bowl game.

Among the major conferences, the ACC finished at 4-2, the Pac-12 at 4-4, the Big 12 at 4-5 and the Big Ten at 2-5. The SEC is 5-3, going into Monday’s BCS championship game between Alabama and Notre Dame.

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