Ask a Big Ten football fan why the SEC is so dominant, and they'll talk about oversigning for at least four minutes before blaming easy SEC scheduling, which usually requires a team to play at least four or five games against ranked teams, probably including one or two against top-five teams, along with a couple in-state jobbers. Of course, on a per-team basis, the Big Ten pretty much already schedules as many FCS programs as the SEC does (and in 2010 and 2008 scheduled more), with its pastry shopping increasing at a rate only outdistanced by the Pac-12.
In fact, over the last five years the Big Ten has scheduled fewer BCS out-of-conference opponents than any other power conference besides the Big 12, while the SEC ranks third behind the ACC and Big East.
Sure, there's more to it than just conference affiliation -- especially when two of the four FBS teams with eight 2011 home games are Big Ten teams -- as all Big Ten programs only schedule really, really great FCS teams, I guess. But it's probably time to find a different excuse.
For more on the war of northern blog aggression, visit Off Tackle Empire and Team Speed Kills. You can guess which covers which conference.