Big Ten football alignment

Wolveagle's ideal Big Ten Alignment:

East: Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Notre Dame, Texas, New England Patriots

West: Indiana, Minnesota, Illinois, Duke, Austin Peay, Hickory High School.

 

Splitting into East-West simply keeps the in-state rivalries, plus the longtime cross-state rivalries like Michigan-Ohio State and Iowa-Minnesota. Plus, I imagine that Iowa-Nebraska could develop into a good rivalry because they're neighboring states.

And, like I said before, it saves a ton of cash, which is what drives college athletics in the first place.

 

I'd say keeping rivals together (Oklahoma-Texas, Alabama-Auburn) has worked better so far than splitting them up (FSU-Miami). Oh well.

 

True, but Iowa-Nebraska and Indiana-Purdue are in the same divisions and will play each other every year ... so they aren't crossover pairings.

 

Reading comprehension makes everything better. I cede the point there is no natural crossover rivalry for those schools as proposed

 

Never understood what the problem was with Michigan and Ohio State in the same division. Are they going to plan annually? I would think that was one of the games you would want to keep on the schedule, much more so than, say, Ohio State-Illinois.

One thing we've learned (or should have learned) is that you can't base alignments based on which teams are strong today, because that will change over time. Try to preserve the rivalries and if one division dominates for a few years, hang on and the balance will shift eventually.

 

Great football special by B10 Network. Leaving no questions unanswered.

Some highlights:

- Schedule is out through 2012
- First championship game will be in Indy
- Indy doing it as a favor because B10 doesnt have time for a search yet
- Future games will be held elsewhere, even outdoors possibly
- 9/12 trophy games will happen every year --- 10/12 happened last year
- U-M/OSU AND ILLINOIS/Minnesota are the only crossover rivals in the last week
- Big Ten still looking at expansion
- Big Ten considering 9th conference game but not until 2015... they need time to figure out things like unbalanced home skeds
- Gene Smith and Dave Brandon (Tom Osborne too) said majority of fans wanted OSU/Mich. at the end of the season
-They never thought about moving the game to Oct. or Sept. only mid-November.
-AD's voted unanimously on schedules for 2011-2012 and division alignment
- Teams need to figure out non-conference stuff before adding a 9th conference game because home games are crucial to revenue
-No division names yet, Delaney mentioned "historical figures" to play into the names. Mentioned great players, coaches, and University administrators.
- Divisions are only for football
- Basketball can do what they want. Haven't decided yet, but if they want divisions they will be different.
- Big Ten wants to play Big Ten teams more, not less.

 

I dont like the OSU-Michigan game as the last week. If they both lead their divisions and are locked in to the title game, how anti-climatic is that to play a week or two later when it will really count?

They should have moved it to the middle of the schedule, that way the rest of the conference can play out and have it mean its most both times if they meet in the title game.

 

Iowa and Purdue. Mmmm.

Iowa and Nebraska on the Friday after Thanksgiving. I'll take that.

Which means Hawkeyes fans will have to skip Thanksgiving dinner and start tailgating that night in Lincoln next year.

 

They didn't move it because the majority of fans didn't want to move it. They addressed the issue and used 2006 as an example. If the teams would have met a second time, it still would have been interesting.

 

Division names should be Grange and Nagurski. Michigan and Ohio State have already gotten everything they wanted - they don't need the divisions named after their sainted coaching heroes.

 

Division names should be Clarrett and Rison.