As a Spartan who has watched Michigan and Ohio State, and Notre Dame when they were regularly on the schedule, receive the benefit of questionable calls over the years; I don't actually believe there are any explicit orders from the conferences to promote the big teams or the winning teams. But I certainly believe there is a general knowledge among the refs of who's supposed to get the calls and who isn't.
As a Spartan who has watched Michigan and Ohio State, and Notre Dame when they were regularly on the schedule, receive the benefit of questionable calls over the years; I don't actually believe there are any explicit orders from the conferences to promote the big teams or the winning teams. But I certainly believe there is a general knowledge among the refs of who's supposed to get the calls and who isn't.