Happy Monday, Eleven Warriors! Feels much better to head into the work week on the heels of an Ohio State win than a loss.
The Buckeyes' recent defensive woes have many fans concerned about other teams in the Big Ten East that have had stronger starts to their seasons. Penn State has knocked off two Top 25 schools already, and although two of Michigan's wins have come against MAC teams, many have remarked that their run game looks much sharper than it has in recent seasons. Of course, the ghosts of the September Wolverines loom large, but even Indiana gave Cincinnati a tough time this past weekend and Michigan State is 3-0 to start the season.
Point is, there are a lot of regional threats right now. And all this thought about the conference has me wondering about what would be best for reorganizing its schools. So for this week's question, if you had the opportunity to reorganize the Big Ten's divisions, what would you change?
How many schools would you move across the division versus keep in place? Would you rename the divisions? Are there any conference rivalries you want to make sure to protect?
For the sake of fun, you can kick two schools of your choice out of the conference, but you have to keep the total teams in each division balanced. You can add one out-of-conference school, but have to kick a team out.
Here's what I would do if given shadow-puppetry powers over Kevin Warren:
GREAT PLAINS (formerly Big Ten West)
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Minnesota
- Nebraska
- Notre Dame
- Purdue
GREAT LAKES (formerly Big Ten East)
- Michigan
- Michigan State
- Northwestern
- Ohio State
- Penn State
- Rutgers
- Wisconsin
This is a realignment that I think works well for representing the Midwest and retaining most of the major conference rivalries. Annual cross-divisional games can protect rivalries that have been lost such as Minnesota/Wisconsin and Illinois/Northwestern. This arrangement is also a sneaky way to ensure Ohio State hardly ever has to travel to Purdue again.
Additionally, I kicked out Maryland and forced Notre Dame to join the Big Ten West. Rutgers gets to stay so the Big Ten can still claim the birthplace of college football.
What would you do?
