Maybe the Pac-12 can look at this as a sign of improvement.
Maybe.
With only five votes representing the conference in the USA Today Coaches poll, Stanford came through again this time with nine votes in the AP poll, ranked the mythical 35th in the nation. That's 14 votes total for the conference in both polls.
The Pac-12 doesn't have anyone else sniffing the top 25 in the country with most teams having already played close to or more than 15 games of their schedule. With the conference games in full swing, the weakness of the conference as a whole is not going to do much for providing a "hot" team with rankings momentum.
How much clout can you attain if you start beating what's proven to be a weak conference? Only time will tell if that team arrives. Until then, it doesn't look like the Pac-12 will be garnering any respect from voters.