East Coast bias rears its head. No surprise, but still a shame. McCaffrey plays for Stanford and after everyone else went to bed.
As far as defenses go, it's a mixed bag. SEC offenses are pretty one-dimensional and similar, so it's easy to have a "top defense" playing against them and the SEC's full cupboard of cupcakes as well.
Pac-12 plays 9 conference games, fewer cupcakes, and far more diverse and potent offenses. Of course defenses have a tougher time.
It's not East Coast bias so much as it is lack of exposure due to the games being so late, as you mentioned. There's ignorance of something, and there's dislike for the sake of bias. This is more the former. People just don't know about him. I don't know much about him, honestly. What I've seen looks really good, and his numbers speak for themselves.
The SEC only has a few pro-style offenses, most are spread. I don't see how it's really that much different than the PAC-12. You can't watch PAC-12 and SEC games and think that the defenses are on the same level across the board. Stanford always has a good defense as does Washington, and there's a few other decent ones. There are some great defensive standouts on the teams in the PAC-12, no doubt, the problem is the lack of talent across the board on defense. That or the lack of quality coaching, not sure.
Cupcake games, sure. I'd like to see a 9 game conference schedule in the SEC and no FCS teams scheduled. I think the latter is coming sooner than later.
Regarding defensive stats, you can get breakdowns of total defense or scoring defense against power 5 teams, or FBS teams only on cfbstats. The numbers are what they are. Defenses aren't as good in the PAC-12.
