That's where the discussion gets off base when it comes to what kind of ratings a school draws for their broadcasts, it's about cable and satellite subscribers in the market. The conferences aren't looking at what team has the most viewers, they want to know how many households that are paying for ESPN, Fox, FS1, etc.

For example, Rutgers may only have 2,000 people watching a game on ESPN (I'm making this number up, BTW, but it's a small number) however because they are in the New York/Trenton DMA, every Dish, Direct or cable subscriber in that footprint that has ESPN is paying a few cents to have the game available whether they watch it or not.

So in other words, if you're a Dish or Comcast subscriber in the Salt Lake/Ogden/Provo DMA, and you have even a minimal package, if the PAC-12 Network is available to you, $0.82 of your cable bill every month is being paid to the PAC-12 even if you never turn the channel on. That's where the networks make their money on college football, not ratings and ad revenue.