Howe: What Now after Big Ten Bombshell?

I'd like to see a division only schedule in the spring and an expanded playoff. 2 from each division would be cool. Give the Big 12 a total of 4.

That's what I proposed in my column. Six games in division and then Big Ten title game. Then come back and maybe play 8-10 games in the fall.
 
I'd like to see a division only schedule in the spring and an expanded playoff. 2 from each division would be cool. Give the Big 12 a total of 4.
That would make 19-20 games total within a 12 month period, not counting any playoff or bowl games that would occur. There's no way that could happen with injuries and recovery. NFL teams don't even play that much.

The alternative would be a severely neutered spring schedule of only 3-4 games maybe, and a shortened 2021 season and nobody wants to see that. What if Goodson or ISM blows a knee out in some shit spring game that means nothing, and then he's gone for a regular 2021 season?

Bite the bullet, shut the whole thing down for a year (it's kids playing a game with a ball for chrissakes), and go back to full systems go next year. We'll survive without football for a year, and then we won't have to deal with lingering injuries or a shortened 2021 because they tried to play a dumb exhibition series in the spring.
 
It depends on what ends up happening with the other Power 5 conferences. If they shut it down before the games kick off or shortly after it this fall, you could put something meaningful together in the spring. That would help athletic department budgets in this fiscal year and help with exposure for players before the NFL Draft. Yes, the marquee guys will sit it out, but other guys are trying to get more on film.

Play six division games in the spring, two teams will play in the B1G championship game and then maybe one team makes the four-team playoff. At most, you're playing eight games and most will play six. Then there's no traditional spring football practice.

Come back with an eight-game schedule in the fall. That's 14 games with no spring football for most teams.

Athletic departments need some revenue in this fiscal year. They will do everything they can to put together a men's basketball season and spring football.
 
That would make 19-20 games total within a 12 month period, not counting any playoff or bowl games that would occur. There's no way that could happen with injuries and recovery. NFL teams don't even play that much.

The alternative would be a severely neutered spring schedule of only 3-4 games maybe, and a shortened 2021 season and nobody wants to see that. What if Goodson or ISM blows a knee out in some shit spring game that means nothing, and then he's gone for a regular 2021 season?

Bite the bullet, shut the whole thing down for a year (it's kids playing a game with a ball for chrissakes), and go back to full systems go next year. We'll survive without football for a year, and then we won't have to deal with lingering injuries or a shortened 2021 because they tried to play a dumb exhibition series in the spring.

Teams that make the Super Bowl have to play 19 or 20 games over 6 month period.

College teams making championship game have to play 15 games in about 4 and 1/2 months.

It can be done. It would require creativity, open-minds, flexibility, and good leadership which is in short supply in general in this country. Too many people would rather be right and have something bad happen than wrong and have something good happen.

But I agree. We can do without football for the fall and honestly we might not have it for the a very long time. We touched on this in another thread recently but college football is at a major tipping point and I don't have a ton of confidence in the leaders to guide it through.
 
Teams that make the Super Bowl have to play 19 or 20 games over 6 month period.

College teams making championship game have to play 15 games in about 4 and 1/2 months.

It can be done. It would require creativity, open-minds, flexibility, and good leadership which is in short supply in general in this country. Too many people would rather be right and have something bad happen than wrong and have something good happen.

But I agree. We can do without football for the fall and honestly we might not have it for the a very long time. We touched on this in another thread recently but college football is at a major tipping point and I don't have a ton of confidence in the leaders to guide it through.
Like we've mentioned before, football and basketball will be fine, and the rest of the sports that go away probably should anyway. Why should football and basketball have to pay for golf, tennis, track and field, gymnastics, soccer, etc? If they can't financially sustain themselves as a program then they should go club level.

Football and basketball pay millions in scholarships, facilities, salaries, and travel for teams that don't contribute back to the department whatsoever. Why not keep that money in the programs?
 
Like we've mentioned before, football and basketball will be fine, and the rest of the sports that go away probably should anyway. Why should football and basketball have to pay for golf, tennis, track and field, gymnastics, soccer, etc? If they can't financially sustain themselves as a program then they should go club level.

Football and basketball pay millions in scholarships, facilities, salaries, and travel for teams that don't contribute back to the department whatsoever. Why not keep that money in the programs?

With this kind of logic you should be running college sports but damn the liberal and Title IX crowd is gonna hate you Trump style.

If we could follow your logic above, my only concern about football and basketball long term is our country's ineptitude at dealing with COVID.
 
With this kind of logic you should be running college sports but damn the liberal and Title IX crowd is gonna hate you Trump style.
The idea of offering a million different sports is an archaic throwback to the days of true amateurism. Well...amateurism is dead.

Back in they day, there was no such thing as highs schoolers getting recruited, there were no elite sports camps, no IMG Academy, no $300,000 scholarships, and no pro leagues for people to use college as a stepping stone to. Collegiate sports were offered by schools for students to participate in for fitness, recreation, and being "well-rounded." So it made sense to offer rowing, tennis, baseball, football, swimming , and track, and a bunch of other shit that nobody really cares about. If you had an obscure interest in archery or fencing, cool...you could do that stuff with your buds in college back in 1931.

Those days are over, but the NCAA wants to keep sanctimoniously telling people it's just amateurism when they make billions of dollars and pay Mark Emmert $5M a year to do jack shit but preach to people during interviews about the morality of college sports, like some kind of second coming of Joel Osteen .

You want to keep amateurism? Fine. Make non-revenue sports club activities...club sports are the very definition of amateurism. But leave football, basketball, and any other money-making sports to their own devices. I'd rather have Farta pay for more shitters in Kinnick than have that money go to buy golf balls and tennis racquets.
 
Last edited:
That's what I proposed in my column. Six games in division and then Big Ten title game. Then come back and maybe play 8-10 games in the fall.

No big deal, but with 7 teams in each division, that would require every werk at least one team in each division to have an off week. Plus what do you do with the Purdue-Indiana game? Do they not play?

One possible solution is to have each team play 7 games with 1 game being against the other division. Plus maybe everybody could play an 8th game the same week as the division winners play in the CCG.
 
He's right, though.

Because both football and basketball aren't happening, I see a very real possibility that Iowa sports will consist in the future of football, MBB, wrestling, and WBB. Along with just enough women's programs to satisfy numbers needed for Title IX.
I'm a sucker for volleyball, call it a guilty pleasure. I'll watch it on BTN on my own free will once in a while. When my daughter and niece played in high school we would go to a couple Badger volleyball games every year.

That a sport I hope we don't lose.
 
Interesting... Hope it goes better then what's going on in GA... The news is making quite the spectacle of what's going on down there.
O'Keefe lives in the next state over. Perhaps he has a better handle on what's really happening than the media.

The media is foaming at the mouth to pounce all over Covid in reopened schools. Every case is going to be news. Why do you think they've come out just in the last week ot two about how Covid is affecting children?

It was affecting children in March and April as well. But it was more of a non story then.

For the record one school had a fourteen case outbreak and 1,000 students are quarantined for the rest of the month. But that's one school district out of how many. And they weren't wearing masks either.
 
This sucks. Beyond belief. Now if the other conferences don't follow suit, the B1G spirals downward. Either way, the stench of this is going to last a long time. Beyond the fans, all those who depend on the revenue of a game will be in financial peril. But not to worry. The university presidents will still run around in their limo's collecting their million dollar paychecks.
 
Football in January and February outside. Yeah...that makes a lot of sense.

I know Minnesota got their field upgraded when the Vikings had to play there so it has a heating system underneath. I have no idea about the rest of the conference. Do any of the others have one? Everyone in the B1G is always done by the end of November.

We all remember Iowa playing BC in Yankee Stadium on a frozen field. It affected the quality of the game and also raises the probability of injuries.

US Bank, Ford Field, Lucas Oil are possibilities but that would mean a lot of flexibility. Lambeau Field has a heated field. I think every NFL stadium has to have one that meets the NFL standards.
 
I'm a sucker for volleyball, call it a guilty pleasure. I'll watch it on BTN on my own free will once in a while. When my daughter and niece played in high school we would go to a couple Badger volleyball games every year.

That a sport I hope we don't lose.
I get it.

I love baseball, but I don’t think football and basketball should have to pay for all those scholarships, facilities, equipment, and salaries. It makes a house of cards and we’re seeing now why it’s a bad idea to hang the livelihood of 20 some different sports on the success of only 2.
 
How long will they have kids in school on campus?... I mean it's too dangerous to play sports but it's ok to have them all on campus going to classes? Since the Presidents are who make these calls wouldn't (shouldn't) that have been their first decision to be making? But no bring all the kids on campus. Make sure tuition checks clear then let em get sick and send em home.... I think we are all fooling ourselves if we think we'll see basketball or spring football either... Chalk me up to not getting my hopes up
We are all idiots

It's always about the money. Presidents want kids on campus because they don't want to see a crash in enrollment as kids do a year at DMACC online for 1/4 the price if they are just doing it online. They don't want to see those on campus housing receipts crash.

They don't want sports, because they don't want to be sued.
 

Average daily temperature in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, and Nebraska is between 12 degrees and 32 degrees. I'm sure Fields and other early entrants are just dying to get on absolutely crap turf at that time in those conditions.
 
Average daily temperature in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa, and Nebraska is between 12 degrees and 32 degrees. I'm sure Fields and other early entrants are just dying to get on absolutely crap turf at that time in those conditions.

If they thought the Big Ten was all about the running game before I can't wait to see what they'd think if we played in January and February.
 
It's always about the money. Presidents want kids on campus because they don't want to see a crash in enrollment as kids do a year at DMACC online for 1/4 the price if they are just doing it online. They don't want to see those on campus housing receipts crash.

They don't want sports, because they don't want to be sued.

Does Iowa still do that thing where DMACC credits transfer freely to Iowa, ISU and UNI? My parents made me pay for my own college and I did like 60 credit hours at DMACC. It was like $75 or $80 per credit hour and I was able to pay for the first two years without any debt. Anyone who goes to one of the regents universities would have to be an absolute moron not to transfer to DMACC and just bang out some credits. If you need upper level classes, maybe go part time at Iowa and take some gen ed credits at DMACC.
 
I get it.

I love baseball, but I don’t think football and basketball should have to pay for all those scholarships, facilities, equipment, and salaries. It makes a house of cards and we’re seeing now why it’s a bad idea to hang the livelihood of 20 some different sports on the success of only 2.
Definitely agree with that.

There are examples across the country where a non revenue sport should be able to support itself. Iowa wrestling is a perfect example. Minnesota hockey. Volleyball at Wiscinsin or Stanford. Womens basketball at Tennessee. Baseball in many Texas and California schools. Track and field at Oregon.

But support is too sporadic in those sports at the vast majority of schools. Even in the B1G, wrestling, volleyball and women's basketball are often played in smaller venues. Sometimes they look like auxiliary gyms, like the ones gymnastics events are held in. Even for all of Lisa Bluder's success it is not unusual for women's games to draw around 3-4,000 fans.
 

Latest posts

Top