New Division Names (football)
New Division names are East and West per ESPN starting in 2014
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/9191768/big-ten-conferen…
The proposed Big Ten West includes the six teams located in the Central time zone -- Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern and Wisconsin -- plus Purdue, sources said. The proposed Big Ten East includes Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State and Rutgers.
It'll be up to Nebraska and Wisconsin to make it happen, I guess.
April 19th, 2013 at 10:15 PM ^
Things don't stay the same. We should look at our own recent history.
Maryland and Rutgers also aren't very good as of the most recent years.
It's actually pretty balanced right now.
@McMurphyESPN 9:14 PM
Legends, Leaders gone in 2014 sources tell @espn. B1G East: IU, Md, Mich, MSU, OSU, PSU, RU; West: Ill, Iowa, Minn, Neb, NW, PU, Wis
They may as well rename it "the late 2000s Big Twelve North"
The top 2 programs of the last 10 years (OSU and Wisconsin) are in opposite divisions. The top 4 programs of the last 10 years (OSU/Michigan and Wisconsin/Nebraska) are evenly split among the divisions. The worst programs of the last 10 years (Minnesota and Indiana) are in opposite divisions. The 4 worst programs of the last 10 years (Minneosta/Illinois and Indiana/Rutgers) are in opposite divisions.
They seem pretty balanced to me.
but you make excellent points. I'm just so happy that the division names are inspired by a compass.
The West will feature the 3-time defending B1G champion (Wisconsin), so how can you say it'll never win? Plus it has a historically great Nebraska program, as well as some solid Iowa and Northwestern programs. It doesn't seem that bad.
We should also keep in mind that PSU is almost certainly headed downhill as the sanctions start to kick in, and MSU is probably done being a league contender now that we're back on our feet and crushing them in recruiting.
Even if the divisions aren't 100% balanced, I don't really care. You can't make that perfect no matter what you do. All leagues with divisions are slightly unbalanced. It'll work itself out. The most important thing is that the rivalries are now all contained within the divisions, except IU-PU.
April 20th, 2013 at 10:35 AM ^
April 20th, 2013 at 11:39 AM ^
Let's be honest here: Michigan-Minnesota stopped being a legitimate rivalry a long time ago. The trophy is cool, but it's not important enough to screw up the divisional setup.
Are you seriously drawing parallels between Michigan-OSU and Michigan-Minnesota? One is routinely called the greatest rivalry in sports. The other, for all practical purposes, is basically Michigan-Indiana with a cool trophy. Minnesota has beaten us three times in the last 45 years, and very few of the games have even been competitive.
Here's a link to a Minnesota message board thread about the new setup. Try to find a single post lamenting the loss of the annual Jug game:
http://www.forums.gopherhole.com/boards/showthread.php?46225-East-West-…
Here's the test: If a lot of Michigan fans actually care about seeing our annual blowout of Minnesota drop off the schedule, Brandon will hear about it and have to make some kind of a statement - "We're exploring the possibility of playing them as a nonconference matchup," something like that. I have a feeling that won't happen. (Though I wouldn't mind playing them in September if that were the case.)
However,
The "Champions of the West" will never win the West division.
April 20th, 2013 at 12:02 PM ^
Disagree. Wisconsin has won or shared the last 3 Big 10 championships. Was that during a down Michigan period? Yes. But they did it. Is their "golden era" over? Who knows - maybe, maybe not. Northwestern won or shared the Big 10 championship in 95 and 96. Maybe a fluke but they did it. Hayden Fry's Iowa regularly competed and won a few times as did the early 2000s Iowa. And Nebraska has no chance to ever win a big 10 championship? Please.
Is it unbalanced - yes. Is the SEEE EEEE CEEEE unbalanced - yes. They seem to do ok.
thank God. I'd rather have Ohio in our division but have a tougher division than have Ohio in the other division. This also gets rid of the difficult back to back playings of The Game.
Because that was annoying when that happened...
It may well happen this year, and certainly would have at some point if we were separate. Keep in mind that Ohio has only been eligible for the B1G title game once.
April 19th, 2013 at 10:40 PM ^
It did happen in the Pac12 this year with UCLA and Stanford.
Because it never happened, it won't?
Many would agreed that Michigan and Ohio are clearly the best 2 teams in the league this year and moving forward. It was going to happen quite often.
The BIG issue is that you were going to be forced to make decisions with players, ala Denard Robinson last year. Do you sit him in "The Game" when it doesn't mean anything from a standings standpoint?
It was eventually going to taint the outcome of that great rivalry game. Coaches may coach different, players may play differently (if they're even on the field), there are a lot of things that could've happened if both teams went into "The Game" with their divisions already locked up and prepared to play the following weekend.
April 20th, 2013 at 10:22 AM ^
Not to mention that under the Leaders/Legends setup, we were going to always play a tougher schedule than our division rivals, and would often have to beat Ohio two weeks in a row to win the B1G title. That was not fair to us (or Ohio).
April 20th, 2013 at 12:07 PM ^
Yes this was the unfair situation in the old setup - both Michigan and Ohio, all things being equal, had the toughest schedule due to their protected rivalry. Compare to Sparty's protected rivalry with (insert laugh here) Indiana for example. That said it was actually a bonus for Ohio during this era since 2008-2011 were not competitive U-M teams but longer term it was not "balanced".
I think the 2011 Michigan team was pretty competitive with OSU.
Gee...that was not too difficult was it? :( ..... :)
First off, I don't care WHO we play.
You really wanted to have a rematch with Ohio over and over and over?
That has to be your only reason. Because if you say no, and assuming you're a Michigan fan. Championship games would likely going to be Michigan vs. Wisconsin by most predicitions...Penn St. is going to be terrible for awhile.
So it's the same as they would be now (with Nebraska/Northwestern also an option). So how are Championship Games going to suck?
April 20th, 2013 at 12:08 PM ^
Because that Wisconsin Michigan State championship 2 years ago was a horrid thing to watch...
So michigan left the Big Ten to join the BIG East?
/s
Nice.
I don't know about Sparty, but I certainly wanted it to be this way. Yeah, it's a bit unbalanced, especially if PSU gets back to being a good team, but the two east coast tomato cans will go a long way towards balancing things out.
April 20th, 2013 at 12:12 AM ^
Because, IMO, if/when we get to 16, we will be going to 4 pods. It will make things much easier to schedule.
Ridiculously earlt to think about this, but If it went to four pods after adding two more East Coast schools, which is what I think is what will happen, I'd like this set-up:
Pod 1: Rutgers, Maryland, PSU, hopefully strong East Coast team
Pod 2: Michigan, Ohio, Michigan State, Other East Coast team (probably not as good as in Pod 1)
Pod 3: Northwestern, Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana
Pod 4: Minnestoa, Iowa, Nebraska, and Illinois
I could see switching some of those Pod 3 and 4 schools to create more competitive balance. Each pod is matched up with another pod every year like the NFL conferences do. That's seven games, and then we play one team from each of the other Pods to give us nine games. Or split up M and Ohio and and have a protected crossover game, though I don't like that idea.
April 20th, 2013 at 12:18 AM ^
Most Spartys I know are pissed. I am thrilled. No more of this crap where we are guaranteed osu and they are guaranteed Indiana. Or where osu plays us, wisky, and 6 cupcakes. We traded nebraska and northwetern for psu and a few tomato cans schedule wise. I see this as a win for us and a small loss for osu and a huge loss for msu. The schedules will never be perfect but they will be more consistantly even with our rivals than before.
April 20th, 2013 at 11:02 AM ^
They could really just get rid of the protected cross-division game altogether and put Northwestern in the East and Indiana and Purdue both in the West. Although the purple people probably wouldn't like the travel.
I still think bitching about the Legends and Leaders thing was a lot of wasted energy.
April 20th, 2013 at 12:09 AM ^
The purple people don't even travel to their own stadium.
April 20th, 2013 at 12:35 AM ^
It's just that the Maize People outnumber them in their own town.