Around the Big Ten

[UMStan White]

Yeah that first offensive play of the season put them on track to beat the spread. The Purdue QB was, I bet, the only power 5 QB that had a worse game than Rudock

[UMStan White]

"(as I'm one of the few that has watched every Purdue game since 2009 haha). "


You and two other "fans"

[whodean]

The conference is continuing its putridity.

Big 2 / Little 12 (and Sparty didn't even look great)

I would not be surprised if oLIEo chokes tonight too

[Cody_Russell]

"(as I'm one of the few that has watched every Purdue game since 2009 haha). "


You and two other "fans"

Yea it's rare to find a Purdue fan that has any knowledge of it's sports teams.
If they have an interest, it's as if they only watch ESPN/ know the macro stuff.

I'm kind of hoping the attendance #s really do bad just to see what happens. (they have already been embarrassing #s)

[WM Wolverine]

Your attendance is already ugly enough. You should be very thankful your campus is centrally located among the University of Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Northwestern...

The B1G money is far too great for Purdue to do anything about their inability to compete and the B1G sure doesn't want to kick any members out. Were stuck with Purdue, amazingly I just looked it up and they have an all-time winning percentage higher than the Illini. Illini amazed me how they always do so little when they should be a better than average B1G program.

[Jeff Buchanan]

The conference is continuing its putridity. ......I would not be surprised if oLIEo chokes tonight too

You would be so wrong.

Tuned in to see Ezekial Elliot rip off an 80 yard run for a TD. It's 14- zip osu after, what, 8 minutes of the first quarter.

[Cody_Russell]

The talent of OSU is too obvious.
Top 3 recruiting classes for the last 5 years and a top 2 coach.

It's like B10 Football can be compared to LeBron James and his bad teammates (excluding recent years with Wade, Kyrie, etc).
Ohio State = LeBron, the rest of the B10 = his crappy teammates (who can be decent at times).
BUT the gap between talent is evident.

[Mike]

That's a fair analogy. Also USC/Pac 10 from 2002-2006.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I'm not dissing the importance of talent by any means and there is a fairly evident talent gap between osu and everyone else in the BT but I think building a dominant football program is just as much about optimizing the talent you get in the system you're running.

ufm runs a plug and play system. It's simple, his spread offense allows for high variance plays to emerge and he's got the coaching staff that can teach talented players how to make those happen. Rodriguez had that potential, but not the talent, at M only to get undermined to the detriment of the football program. The talent would have come with winning, like it does for ufm. That's another discussion we've pretty much worn out.

Anyway, as hard as it is for the rest of the BT to match osu's talent advantage at this point, it's not hard to optimize what you have to play good football and challenge for championships. I'd like to think there are a few teams that are fully capable of doing that, Michigan and HARBAUGH!!! among them.

[iam416]

I'll move this discussion over here. There seems to be a rough consensus that the spread is a really good system for attacking with suboptimal talent. What I think is the interesting question is what system works best with optimal talent? As I mentioned in another thread, I can't think of a team that ran the spread and had talent everywhere. 2005 Texas, IMO, wasn't a true spread team. As a quasi-spread team, though, they had The Vince, an asskicking OL and some pretty good skill players and scored a bajillion points. Oregon, IMO, has never had a really good OL. They lack the "power run" option.

So, OSU is out there running an aggressive offense with a really good OL and really good everything else. They have a really good power running game, gamebreaking horizontal speed and QB(s) and WRs that can stretch the field. And it's all in play on every play, it seems.

What JH is working toward is an unstoppable 5 or more yards every play sort of offense. They won't have the same big plays as a spread team, but they'll always go forward.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I think we're getting down to the nutz and bolts of college football here .... but alas, I'm headed for the bike and a grinding work-out. I'll be back later to add my two cents.

[iam416]

I forgot about the 2008 Crocs. Duh. That offense was really talented.

[froot loops]

B10 is 3-6 vs FBS teams in week one.

Terrible conference except for Ohio State, who gets top 3 recruiting classes and has a top 3 head coach.

Did MSU leave the Big Ten? They've won 11 games 4 of the last 5 years and finished in the top 5 the last two.

[Mike]

He must have forgotten about them. Most people do.

[froot loops]

You don't and that is what's important.