Huge horizontal bands from coast to coast are an illogical way to organize college football conferences. The United States is almost twice as wide as it is tall! Vertical strips split the country into more balanced conferences with shorter travel distances. Organizing this way also divides up the most prime, fertile recruiting grounds (California, Texas, Florida, Alabama and Georgia) in a fairly even way. Obviously the Big West still ends up being a very large conference in terms of landmass, but this is necessary for the correct number of teams.