NW has a one game lead in the B1G West

Submitted by Bambi on October 27th, 2018 at 7:49 PM

They're the only B1G West team with one conference loss (to Michigan). They have wins and the tiebreakers over Wisconsin and Purdue. They host ND next week and then travel to Iowa the week after. Their remaining B1G games are Illinois and Minnesota.

If they win against Iowa they pretty much punch their ticket to the B1G title game. If they lose they still have a very legit shot with Iowa having games @Purdue and vs Nebraska remaining, plus whatever tiebreakers end up mattering based on final standings in the West.

Maybe this will finally change the narrative of our gane @ NW.

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WestCBlue

October 27th, 2018 at 7:56 PM ^

According to Don Brown, current coach at Michigan, current Defensive Coordinator at....Michigan, the narrative he described post 2018 NW win was thus:

"That's the second biggest comeback on the road in Michigan football history against a QB, Thorson, who will go down as one of the Top 25 QB's in BIG 10 conference history."  A shoulder shrug and a mustache wiggle later, "To me, that's pretty good."

So, some of us tend to follow that narrative, which can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfpukWVjKNI

 

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Hail Harbo

October 27th, 2018 at 8:06 PM ^

For a bit over a week now I've been laid up and unable to walk thus I've become quite bored and have spent an inordinate amount of time reading the front page, diary columns, and the board.  This being a bye week there has been a lot of talk about very little, so I opened this thread in hopes of talking about something that concerns us one and all.  And do you know what?  I did find something that concerns us all, I found that you outed yourself as being a condescending bitch.

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DrMantisToboggan

October 27th, 2018 at 7:57 PM ^

I know we make this joke about Ryan Field anyways, but Indianapolis would be 90% Michigan fans.

Still think I would prefer Iowa, but either Iowa or Northwestern would be great for us in the BTCG. Now we just have to get there.

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AZBlue

October 27th, 2018 at 9:52 PM ^

It seems that way.  Iowa’s ranking seems to have been propped up by too much credit for the close loss to “potential CFP contender” Wisconsin and early season win over a “decent” Iowa State.

Aside from the overvaluation of Wisconsin, the B1G seems to have shaken out as predicted.  The “big 4” in the East are the top 4 - though the order has changed.   Iowa, Wisconsin, and NW are probably next with Purdue taking the role as “chaos team”.  Illinois and Rutgers are the clear bottom dwellers 

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Sideline

October 28th, 2018 at 8:25 AM ^

Northwestern could even come in at 3... It’s Michigan, Ohio State, and then There’s a significant drop to 3, Northwestern looks better than Penn State YTD. The Wildcats also have Notre Dame and Iowa left. That loss to Akron stings, but this could be an 8-4 team rolling into Indy. Who knows, Notre Dame could have a slip up next week. It’s what makes this sport so great!

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NittanyFan

October 27th, 2018 at 8:11 PM ^

In that scenario, the tie-breakers would go all the way down to "the combined aggregate conference record of the 3 teams they played in the East."

That's a pretty bizarre way to break a tie, but they'd all be 1-1 vs. each other and 5-1 vs. the B1G West.  So it would go down to that. 

That above metric takes precedence over "overall record, including non-conference games."  That's a new thing this year as opposed to 2016 (when overall record, including non-conference games WOULD have taken precedence had U-M/OSU/PSU all finished in a tie at 8-1).

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J.

October 27th, 2018 at 9:09 PM ^

I never liked the idea that non-Big Ten games affected the Big Ten tiebreaker.  It felt very Big East-y (“Highest ranked team in the BCS wins! Yay!”)

Whoever writes the actual tiebreaker text for the Big Ten needs to be fired, though.  They remain as confusing as ever, starting with #1: “The records of the three tied teams will be compared against each other.” Taken literally, you compare the teams’ records, which are known to be identical since they’re tied. What they actually mean, of course, is “The records of the three tied teams against one another will be compared,” which is very much not the same thing.

Anyway — if Iowa and Wisconsin win out, and Northwestern loses only to Iowa, then NittanyFan is exactly correct; it goes at least to the fifth tiebreaker.  Here’s the breakdown:

  1. First tie-breaker is head-to-head within the tied group.  All teams are 1-1 against each other.
  2. Second tie-breaker is division record.  Each is 5-1 in the division and 2-1 against the East.
  3. Third tie-breaker is comparing the record against the non-tied division teams, in order.  So, if Purdue finishes fourth, Nebraska fifth, Minnesota sixth, and Illinois seventh, you’d first compare the tied teams’ records against Purdue, then against Nebraska, etc.  In this case, it doesn’t matter, as all three tied teams would be undefeated agianst the four teams not in the tie.
  4. Fourth tie-breaker is the aggregate record against all common conference opponents.  Northwestern’s East division schedule is Michigan, MSU, and Rutgers; Wisconsin’s is Michigan, Penn State, and Rutgers; and Iowa’s is Indiana, Penn State, and Maryland.  Since there are no common East division opponents between all teams, this tie-breaker devolves to the same as the division record; each team will be 5-1 against common division opponents.
  5. Fifth tie-breaker is the “best cumulative winning percentage of non-divisional opponents,” which is another (fittingly for the Big Ten, more complicated) way to say what NittanyFan said.  Currently, Northwestern’s opponents are a combined 8-7, Wisconsin’s are 8-7, and Iowa’s are 7-9, meaning Northwestern would win the tie if the season ended today.  We can do better, though.  Because NW and Wisconsin do have two teams in common, for those two teams, this particular tiebreaker boils down to MSU’s record as compared to PSU’s record.  If MSU has a better record than PSU, Wisconsin is eliminated — and we’re assuming a third loss for PSU by assuming Wisconsin wins out.  Iowa’s position is very weak in this tiebreaker, because Indiana is almost as bad as Rutgers — that’s their only conference win, after all — and neither PSU nor Maryland is as good as Michigan.

So — Northwestern is in the division driver’s seat.  Wisconsin needs two NW losses, or a NW loss to Iowa plus, probably, two MSU losses.  Iowa needs to beat Northwestern and have Purdue (or somebody) beat Wisconsin.

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NittanyFan

October 27th, 2018 at 9:44 PM ^

"Peak Jim Delany" would be a scenario where the B1G WEST title was dependent on the result of a 3:30 PM ET game between 1-10 Rutgers and 5-6 Michigan State, with thtat game being played in a sleet-storm in front of 10,000 fans.

That's actually not completely unrealistic.

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Newton Gimmick

October 28th, 2018 at 12:51 AM ^

If we go by S&P projections, all four of Northwestern, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Purdue will finish 6-3 in Big Ten play.  I'd love a chaotic situation like that.  (My dream is one year every team in the ACC Coastal finishes 4-4.)

Anyway, according to S&P these would be the losses for each team:

NW losses: Michigan, Iowa, Minnesota

Iowa losses: Wisconsin, Penn St, Purdue

Wisconsin losses: Michigan, Northwestern, Penn St

Purdue losses: Northwestern, Michigan St, Wisconsin

In such a scenario, Iowa and Purdue would be eliminated, because they went 1-2 against the other tied teams, whereas Northwestern and Wisconsin would have each gone 2-1.

Because Northwestern won today, they win the head-to-head tiebreaker and would still go to the B1G championship game, even if they lost to both Iowa and Minnesota.

It would be kind of awesome if they did that (and took down Notre Dame along the way.)

 

 

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M_Born M_Believer

October 27th, 2018 at 9:22 PM ^

So I just had to go look and it would not favor Iowa. 

NW has played:

Michigan

Michigan St

Rutgers

so I initially thought Oh crap, Rutgers. Then I looked up Wisconsin. They have/had

Michigan

Penn St

Rutgers

Thwn I looked up Iowa, their screwed. They have / had

Maryland

Indiana

Penn State

 

So Iowa would be eliminated and NW heads to Indy with the head to head win over Wisconsin. 

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WolverineHistorian

October 27th, 2018 at 8:09 PM ^

The West division made it interesting for one whole weekend.  Now I'm back to feeling like they should be disqualified from the conference championship game and the East winner should automatically be conference champion.  

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stephenrjking

October 27th, 2018 at 8:57 PM ^

This is actually a good idea. They could call their conference the little 10. Since the teams aren’t going to win the important stuff, Rutgers and Maryland would switch over, and Penn State would follow them to preserve their important regional rivalry. Then Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Purdue, and Northwestern would switch to our division (now simply titled the “Big Ten Conference”) to balance things out. We’d have the Big Ten and the Little Ten and only one of us would have a title that is unable to count. 

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Muttley

October 27th, 2018 at 9:12 PM ^

I think the B1G West compares rather favorably to the weaker divisions of the ACC (Coastal) & the PAC-12 (South).  It's not as top strong as the SEC East but is comparable at the middle.  

IMO, the B1G West has four 25ish teams,  Wisky lost an intra division game on the road w/ their starting QB out, while Iowa and Purdue both lost on the road to two 25ish B1G East teams.  And IMO those four teams would be in the upper half of the ten-team Big 12.

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ak47

October 27th, 2018 at 11:59 PM ^

What is the evidence the big ten west is good? Purdue lost to eastern Michigan and Missouri, northwestern lost to duke and Akron, Wisconsin lost to BYU.

Which is more likely? All of those teams got so much better they are now top 25 teams? Or the big ten is bad and beating each other means nothing other than that are all teams in the 40-60s range? Those other divisions aren’t good but they are all the same level of shit

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