The B1G 10....

Submitted by michiganman01 on

Welp, another bad week for the B1G 10.

Indiana lost to BGSU (45-42)

Minnesota getting blown out by TCU (30-0 4th)

West Virginia beats Maryland (40-37)

Washington beating Illinois (38-19 4th Q) kinda expected though

And ISU just kicked a FG to take a 20-17 lead on Iowa with 2 seconds left

EDIT: and the miracle didnt happen. So ISU won

 

Can it get any worse?

 

I Like Burgers

September 13th, 2014 at 9:39 PM ^

For Michigan to truely be elite, they need the rest of the Big Ten to be good.  Look at Ohio State, they've rolled through their schedule (last 5 or so games excluded of course) the last couple of seasons, but I don't know if many would call them truly elite on the national stage.  The knock is always that they beat up on shitty Big Ten teams.

This is one of the things that pisses me off about Michigan and Big Ten fans.  They are way too short sighted when it comes to the conference.  You should never, ever want the rest of the conference to "burn to the ground."  The conference needs respect in the worst way possible, so you should root for the Wisconsins and MSUs to beat LSU and Oregon.  What's good for them is good for Michigan.  Because if the conference keeps going down the road its going, Michigan -- or any other Big Ten program for that matter -- can't build an elite program on a foundation of ashes.

snarling wolverine

September 14th, 2014 at 12:40 AM ^

As much as Iowa fans bitch about Ferentz, the reality is 1) they're Iowa, with basically no recruiting base and 2) Ferentz is one of their best coaches in school history.  Despite point #1, he has them going to bowls every year and has won some B1G titles and BCS bowls in his career. 

It could easily get much worse for them if they fire him.

 

I Like Burgers

September 13th, 2014 at 9:43 PM ^

Unless they have an undefeated team, the Big Ten is always going to be the 5th team on the outside looking in when it comes to the playoffs.  The stregth (or lack thereof) of schedule is going to kill every good team.

And your mid-tier ACC teams are a lot better than your mid-tier Big Ten teams.  Did you already forget that Va. Tech beat Ohio State at home last week?

aiglick

September 13th, 2014 at 7:01 PM ^

You should. If we go hypothetically 11-1 this year, don't think we will but certainly there's a chance until that second number hits 0, we will probably be left out.

Michigan needs a conference that is perceived to be strong enough to win one of those four spots. Yeah this year it would be nice to compete for a Big Ten championship. Eventually I'd like us to be competing for national titles.

I Like Burgers

September 13th, 2014 at 9:48 PM ^

Your three contenders for the playoffs are MSU (blown out by Oregon), Ohio State (ugly loss at home to Va. Tech) and Wisconsin (loss to LSU).  Of those three, only Wisconsin really has a chance unless Oregon runs the table and that's MSU's only loss.  And in that scenario, Oregon is in, FSU is probably in, and an SEC team is definitely in.  So you're left picking between someone like Oklahoma or Baylor and MSU.  And their resume is going to look a lot better than MSU's.

I'm telling you, the Big Ten is going to be left out of the playoffs more than any other Power 5.  They are that bad right now.

Gulogulo37

September 14th, 2014 at 1:44 AM ^

Not sure I'd really call those weird. The interception was just plain bad. Darboh needs to take care of the ball; I thought the defender smashed it out with his helmet which is understandable, but it looked like it came out when his butt grazed the ball. Marcus Ray mentioned too when he was fighting for that first down that he's still not wrapping it up while getting tackled. The short kickoff was probably a fluky kind of thing though.

But Michigan also had a bunch of penalties, some declined, during that time. I agree we shouldn't get too worked up about it, but they looked pretty damn bad for that stretch.

snowcrash

September 13th, 2014 at 7:02 PM ^

If you mean that we were in actual danger today, we weren't. We had one bad stretch in the first half where we gacked it up 3 times, but apart from that this was a completely one-sided game. M had 460 yards, NTM had 198.

On the other hand if you just mean that the B1G could have looked worse if M (or OSU for that matter) had laid an egg like everyone else did, I agree.

 

alum96

September 13th, 2014 at 6:55 PM ^

A Lloyd Carr team of the early 00s would be undefeated in the modern Big 10.  Assuming we got those type of recruits.  My concern is how few NFL type prospects are really on this team versus that era.  Speaks to the recruiting base really going downhill. 

But truly a spectacular piece of garbage conference.  We only have 1 more week of getting exposed.  Then we all play each other and can feel better about it. Sigh.

snarling wolverine

September 14th, 2014 at 12:53 AM ^

Juice never did anything against Carr's teams.  It was the Rich Rod teams that he abused.

Also, we only adopted a zone blocking scheme in Carr's last couple of years, and a big reason why we ran zone left so much those years was that we had a future NFL #1 overall pick at left tackle (Jake Long).

Carr had his shortcomings, but on the whole he was a fine coach.