Around the Big Ten

[Jamie H]

Florida, Arizona and California yeah. Texas has had some pretty crappy bowl game weather, as has Louisiana (but their game is indoors).

[madootra]

Nobody does? Try and get tickets at Lambeau from a Packer fan. I love winter weather, I love watching football, and if I'm a fan of the team....I guess I'm enjoying myself watching them when they play outdoors in "bad" weather. When did we become a nation of "Weather Pussies"? ;-)

[entropy]

Sounds like wispy is getting a new QB. I would have to make them the favorites now

[WM Wolverine]

That was one of their huge question marks, this could put them above PSU & OSU in the East if they weren't already...

Speaking of division alignments, who were the big losers? Anyone have a significant beef with where they ended up relative to a straight east-west split? As a M fan, I'd have preferred to play PSU, MSU, OSU every season; schedule wise M traded PSU, Indiana & Purdue for Nebraska, Iowa & Northwestern.

I thought beating PSU was good for recruiting in the northeast; Pennsylvania, Jersey, Maryland. I thought M's recruiting in the northeast improved when they were beating PSU most the time. Schedule is harder but most of that can be blamed on the annual rivalry games that put the top teams against the top teams; M vs OSU, PSU vs Neb, Wisc vs Iowa? Overall, I'm 'okay' but not thrilled with how things ended up, more disappointed the silly names of legends and leaders. Makes me want to throw up, I'll continue to refer to them as east and west...

Nebraska traded Wisconsin & Illini, for M & MSU and a PSU rivalry game. Schedule wise they get lucky by not playing Wisky & OSU in some seasons...

Relative to an east-west split; MSU gets to avoid PSU, OSU & Purdue in place of Neb, Iowa & NW. They make out pretty well...

Wisconsin is the most out of place; they lose out on all of Minnesota, Nebraska & NW while gaining OSU, PSU, Indiana & Purdue.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Wisconsin was the biggest loser in divisional alignment. They lost games against Iowa and Northwestern, picked Indiana and Purdue, and were forced to use Minnesota as their cross-division game instead of Nebraska like they were hoping.

I understand why it was done to balance out power but if we ever do expand again I hope they make it into a western division instead (although I do like playing them every year)

[Dr. Strangelove]

I'll go back to the alignment I posted maybe two weeks ago

Nebraska
Iowa
Minnesota
Wisconsin
Northwestern
Purdue
Notre Dame

Michigan
MSU
Penn State
Ohio State
Illinois
Indiana
*Some team from the east (Pitt, Maryland, Etc.)

9-game conference schedule, maybe 2 permanent cross-divison rivals instead of one?

Problem for Notre Dame might be that they are probably more interested in exposure in Ohio, PA, and the east coast than the upper midwest

[WM Wolverine]

Not much reason for 2 cross-division rivals if the divisions are set up well.

ND does mess things up,they'd want to continue rivalries with M, MSU and Purdue for starters. They'd want to play PSU to get big coverage on the east coast and would want to keep games with USC/Stanford late in the season. They can't have it all, they'd have to make some compromises but the B10 would be very lucky to land them and they'd need to compromise to entice them to join.

[Dr. Strangelove]

TV Schedule for opening weekend is all set

Thursday
Wisconsin vs. UNLV (8PM ESPN)

Friday
Michigan State vs. Youngstown State (7:30PM BTN)

Saturday
Ohio State vs. Akron (12PM ESPN or ESPN2)
Northwestern @ Boston College (12PM ESPN U)
Penn State vs. Indiana State (12PM BTN)
Purdue vs. Middle Tennessee State (12PM BTN)
Iowa vs. Tennessee Tech (12PM BTN)
Minnesota @ USC (3:30PM ABC)
Michigan vs. Western Michigan (3:30PM ABC)
Illinois vs. Arkansas State (3:30PM BTN)
Nebraska vs. Chattanooga (3:30PM BTN)

Indiana vs. Ball State (?)

[Hannibal]

Wow what a shitty schedule. Is there a single game worth watching the first weekend in any conference?

[Dr. Strangelove]

You take what you can get the first weekend

The only really big games are Oregon vs. LSU and Boise vs. Georgia

Couple others...Miami/Maryland, SMU/A&M, BYU/Ole Miss, South Florida/Notre Dame

[Hannibal]

I don't understand why ABC and ESPN don't pressure the conferences a little more to at least move their games around so that the first weekend doesn't suck so bad. Not to mention, they have completely abandoned the 12:00 time slot and stacked all of the good games at once, when nobody could possibly watch all of them. Seems really stupid. I'd watch something like Minnehaha at USC or South Florida at Notre Dame if Michigan wasn't on at that same time.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Pitt and Penn State to resume series in 2016-2017

http://www.pittsburghpanthers.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/061411aaa.html

[WM Wolverine]

Good for PSU, they need to play teams like Maryland, Pitt & Rutgers more often.

[entropy]

agree. They shouldn't have killed some of those old rivalries

[Dr. Strangelove]

Penn State has series with Virginia, Rutgers, and Syracuse between now and then. They are definitely trying to maintain an eastern presence.