What happened, these research institutions did a blind study, so each school was just assigned a letter or random number? They didn't know who was who and just looked at what happened three years ago to today?

Utah may have "won the conference" and made Rose Bowl appearances, but even in a blind study, I don't know how you can say the trajectory is something to be happy with.

Used to win every bowl game; has lost their last 4 or 5 bowl games.
Used to win OOC games; can't beat a P5 OOC and has lost many G5 OOC games.
In the five years before COVID, won 10 games once and 11 games once, and lost four games in another season; 10-4 record the past 2 seasons (that's stagnant, not an upward trajectory).

Other than USC and UCLA, who has really shown a trajectory to be happy with?