That's close to my proposed alignment. My opinion: the slotted divisional pairings and the proposed protected rivalries don’t make sense. Not to me anyway. Is Illinois-Purdue a rivalry? NW-Indiana? While those four don’t have any clout in deciding whom their rival is going to be or which division they'll be in, there is a better way even for them, I think.
We all know what is known about alignment or what can be reasonably assumed from the trial balloons and talking heads paraphrasing whispers from those inside the latte-laden conference rooms.
The unknowns boil down to two:
1. Which directions Iowa and Wisconsin will go. And while I think both schools are the keys to determining divisional alignments based on the two most important criteria, Wisconsin is the master key.
2. Which school gets Nebraska as a rival? PSU, as some yearn for in recapturing their youth, or Wisconsin as Alvarez and Bielema have been in campaign mode like they‘re channeling Bill Clinton.
The answer to #2 I’m thinking will go a long way in determining the answer to #1.
So here is the guessing part.
Wisconsin has put feelers out for getting Nebraska as a rival -- either as a divisional rival or an inter-division protected rival -- trying to trump Iowa or PSU. That's not good news for Iowa because in that pecking order, Iowa is #3.
Pinned to a white trial balloon with two center-red stripes this message was found in Barry’s handwriting: “If we go to the East then we want Nebraska as our protected rival. If we can’t get that, then we want to be in the West with Nebraska and you can move Iowa to the East.“
While the talking heads want to see the Big10 setting up PSU and Nebraska as protected rivals, I have yet to read or hear anything about Penn State wanting that. So I’m giving the nod to Wisconsin going East and Iowa going West. Both schools and Nebraska are happy.
And so is PSU. If MSU is big enough to play a rivalry with the Notre Dame, then they’re big enough to play a rivalry game with PSU. Besides, when ND joins the Big10, PSU will gladly call, “DIBBS!” after “voluntarily sacrificing” their rivalry with Nebraska.
With Wisconsin going East, Minnesota will go with them to maintain the longest rivalry in college football -- or something like that. Iowa then will get Minnesota as their protected rival. That's a big negative for me since Iowa-Wisconsin is a solid, equal, head-knocking rivalry.
And now is where I disagree with the Talking/Typing Heads. The remaining four teams make sense to split up because of their geography for the following reasons: by splitting up the in-state schools, (1) these schools will have “natural” rivals for the Big10 Rivalry Weekend. (2) fan and media attention within these states will be decentralized -- in other words, the focus within these larger population states will be split between both divisions rather than focusing on one division as would be the case if both state schools were in the same division. That's not a huge deal, but when getting down to this level, minutia matters. And I think it will help in decreasing the likelihood that the Big10 will become as compartmentalized/regionalized as the Big12 was. That ended up not being a good thing.
So the divisions look like this:
EAST . . . . . . WEST
OSU <- - - - > MICH
PSU < - - - - > MSU
WIS < - - - - > NEB
MIN <- - - - -> IOWA
PUR < - - - - > IND
ILL <- - - - - > NW
Not much of a difference from Miller's in the upper half. However . . . Following The Delaney Realignment Rules had me thinking the bottom quartet in a little different light.
After setting up the divisions, I spent some time during a Big10 Greatest Games Replay to do some stats from different perspectives and shades. Here are the categories with the numbers below. The first column contains three numbers: the first is conference record above .500% , the second is =.500%, the third is under .500%. The second column is number of seasons in the top 4 finishes and in the bottom 4 finishes in the conference standings (including ties).
School . . . . Record . . T4-B4 . .Wins
1. OSU . . . 15-1-1 . . . 15-1 . . . 106
2. MICH . . 15-0-2 . . . .12-2 . . . .94
3. NEB . . . 13-1-3 . . . .12-2 . . . .97
4. PSU . . . 12-3-2 . . . .9-2 . . . . .91
5. WIS . . . 10-2-5 . . . .8-3 . . . . .79
6. IOWA . . .7-4-6 . . . . 7-5 . . . . 71
7. NW . . . . 7-1-9 . . . . 6-9 . . . . .59
8. MSU . . . .5-6-6 . . . . 3-6 . . . . .63
8. PURD . . . 5-5-7 . . . . 4-7 . . . . .63
10. ILL . . . . 3-3-11 . . . 2-10 . . . .45
11. MIN . . . .2-2-13 . . . 2-9 . . . . .44
12. IND . . . .1-1-15 . . . 0-14 . . . . 31
Looking at the >.500% records and top 4 finishes, the seeding (surprisingly) lines up well with the conference alignment I propose. But there is a better way to determine divisional competitiveness top-to-bottom. By adding the stats of each school the division totals look like this:
DIV . . . . Record . . . T4-B4 . .Wins
East . . . . 47-16-39 . . 40-32 . . 427
West . . . .48-13-41 . . 40-38 . . 415
Those stats are amazingly balanced in spite of OSU’s dominance and Indiana’s ineptness. There is no way that Indiana and Minnesota should be placed in the same divisions with sub-.500 records in 17 years numbering 15 and 13 respectfully (or disrespectfully).
Flipping Iowa-Wisconsin would tilt the >.500% records to the West from a difference of +1 to a difference of +7. That's not huge, but it is substantial and would disassemble the natural rivals mentioned above.
Flipping the final four entrants as pairs would skewer the stats in making the East very light at the bottom and making the West, like me, with a lot more girth around its middle.
This flip does make some sense to me if the proposed OSU-PSU-WIS trinity balk at a top-tier that is slightly heavier than the West and want a break at the bottom of the division. That would not be in line with The Delaney Realignment Rule #1, although it would still maintain all the natural rivalries (Delaney Rule #2). In any proposed alignment, Delaney Rule #3 is going to be stretched, but stretching wouldn't be beyond recognition or be necessarily a bad thing.
I feel like I've wandered into The Three Rules of Robotics that are supposed to be absolute but always finding some way of being bent ever so slightly to bring about the story's end. Jim Delaney is the sports version of sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov.
And now I'm picturing Will Smith lacing up Converse canvas high-tops -- sweeeeet.
If he would only have had a pair of cleats hanging over his shoulder . . .
