The Pac-12 last week sounded trumpets and shot off virtual fireworks when it won its 500th NCAA championship, dating to Cal’s 1922 track and field title.
No other league, in its current membership, has more than 307. It’s enough to have Bill Walton hammer the “Conference of Champions” platform into every sentence of his TV basketball analysis.
But the Pac-12’s 500 might not be what it appears to be.
It includes 26 Colorado and 10 Utah NCAA skiing championships before the Buffaloes and Utes joined the Pac-12. It includes a 1936 Washington State boxing title and some long-ago rowing and water polo championships that were accomplished against limited competition.
But it still adds to 500, and that’s a reason to celebrate in any league.
The backbone of the league’s many championships isn’t football (nine) or men’s basketball (21). It is a compilation of men’s and women’s cross country and indoor and outdoor track. Those teams have won 97 of the 500 national championships. Runner-up? Men’s and women’s tennis, at 73.
