Who gets their way in alignment: Wisconsin or Iowa?

[CAARHawk]

Why can't the Big 3 in each division be? Michigan Ohio State Wisconsin, and Iowa Penn State Nebraska?

One reason is that you are asking the two teams that are on the farthest edge of the conference to play each other. That is asking a lot with fan travel. If you let one group of teams just travel to contiguous schools and then make everyone else travel half way across the country, it is going to show up in team records. Particularly if PSU as the farthest team east had to play all their games in the West.

Just not a good idea.

 

[DDHawkeye]

Putting Iowa in the eastern division would be horrible. I don't want Wisconsin in the eastern division either. We should play Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Minnesota every year in my opinion, and I also think Wisconsin should play Iowa, Nebraska, and Minnesota every year. So, keep Iowa, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Minnesota all in the west. I would also like to keep playing PSU every year, so I think those early ideas people had where PSU was in the west would be a good outcome. Either that, or split the conference right down the border between Illinios and Indiana. OSU, Michigan, PSU, Mich St, Purdue, and Indiana are not that much better of a group of teams than Iowa, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, and Northwestern. The Big Ten championship game will be competitive with those divisions almost every year. The last decade has been dominated by Ohio State, so divisions would appear lopsided no matter what, even if Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Penn State, and Michigan State were in one division, and Ohio State was in a division with only cupcakes. If nobody beats Ohio State, then it doesn't matter what the divisions are.

 

[JonDMiller]

Scott Dochertman of the Gazette tweeted this to me:

I think teams get tied in pairs. OSU-PSU, Mich-MSU, Iowa-Neb, Wis-Minn, Ind-Purd, Ill-NW, divided from there
------

Interesting thought

 

[dchawk75]

Several thoughts come to mind in reading this thread. First of all, from a perception and long term success standpoint, you cannot equate Iowa and Wisconsin with Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State and Nebraska. Therefore, Iowa and Wisconsin must be split up. Deace and Jon were pre-occupied with whether Iowa or Wisconsin would get first choice to be with Nebraska. The fact is neither will. If the League requires Nebraska to have Penn State as its protected rival for television ratings purposes, you can bet Nebraska will be allowed to make the selection to play Iowa every year. The only way that can happen is to put Iowa in Nebraska's division since Nebraska's protected rival would be Penn State. Also, from a geographic standpoint, Nebraska needs a team closer than 500 miles from Lincoln as a rival and the only candidate is Iowa.

Finally, the West needs either Michigan, Penn State or Ohio State along with Iowa and Nebraska for the perception of divisional balance (the rest of the country and the media do not view Iowa and Wisconsin as the equivalent of the current Big 3 of the Big 10) and for television ratings purposes. Simply put, the West needs a big market program to go along with small market states of Iowa and Nebraska. The Michigan pairing with Iowa and Nebraska makes a lot of sense.

 

[iHawk]

Scott Dochertman of the Gazette tweeted this to me:

I think teams get tied in pairs. OSU-PSU, Mich-MSU, Iowa-Neb, Wis-Minn, Ind-Purd, Ill-NW, divided from there
------

Interesting thought

Perfect.

East

OSU
PSU
Michigan
MSU
Purdue
Indiana

West

Iowa
Nebraska
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Northwestern
Illinois

Love it!!!

 

[busabus114]

Michigan and Nebraska will be in one division. Penn State and Ohio State will be in the opposite division. The next two most successful programs since 1993, the criteria Jim Delany set out, are Wisconsin and Iowa.

I would suggest both programs would want to be in the west with Michigan and Nebraska....who gets their way? Who gets to call in their marker? Barry Alvarez is like a freaking unofficial spokesman for the Big Ten right now...one of two men to ever win three Rose Bowls as a coach...along with Woody Hayes...he is very active..and young.

Who wins the showdown?

Have you considered this? I had not, until this morning.

WEST

Michigan
Nebraska
WISCONSIN
Michigan State
Minnesota
Northwestern

EAST

OSU
PSU
IOWA
Indiana
Purdue
Illinois

Have you thought about this? Do you like it? I am not a fan of it...and I understand the instant thought; no way is Iowa not playing Nebraska....well, Wisconsin wants exactly what Iowa wants...someone is going to be ticked off...who gets to play their chip?

My guess is this would never happen but if it did it would suck.

I am still convinced that OSU and Mich will be in the same division and the story this week that they wouldnt was just to gauge the backlash

 

[H8IAST8]

Several thoughts come to mind in reading this thread. First of all, from a perception and long term success standpoint, you cannot equate Iowa and Wisconsin with Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State and Nebraska. Therefore, Iowa and Wisconsin must be split up. Deace and Jon were pre-occupied with whether Iowa or Wisconsin would get first choice to be with Nebraska. The fact is neither will. If the League requires Nebraska to have Penn State as its protected rival for television ratings purposes, you can bet Nebraska will be allowed to make the selection to play Iowa every year. The only way that can happen is to put Iowa in Nebraska's division since Nebraska's protected rival would be Penn State. Also, from a geographic standpoint, Nebraska needs a team closer than 500 miles from Lincoln as a rival and the only candidate is Iowa.

Finally, the West needs either Michigan, Penn State or Ohio State along with Iowa and Nebraska for the perception of divisional balance (the rest of the country and the media do not view Iowa and Wisconsin as the equivalent of the current Big 3 of the Big 10) and for television ratings purposes. Simply put, the West needs a big market program to go along with small market states of Iowa and Nebraska. The Michigan pairing with Iowa and Nebraska makes a lot of sense.

Aren't Minneapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Louis large enough markets? The answer is yes. Keep the geographic boundries.

 

[83Hawk]

Michigan and Ohio State should NOT be split. I hope to heck these "rumblings" are totally false.

Put Penn State, Michigan and Ohio State in the East, Iowa, Nebraska and Wisconsin in the West. Problem solved.

 

[DuffMan]

I honestly don't understand the absolute "scUM and fOSU have to be in separate divisions". I realize that it eliminates the possiblity of an fOSU scUM title game but I think that matters.

I know this for a fact. fOSU and scUM will always be one of the biggest football games of the year when played (regardless of whether its a conf title game or a regular season) and the B10 title game will be one of the biggest football games of the year regardless of who is playing in it.

If the only reason we can't separate geographically is fOSU and scUM will be in the same division then the powers that be are looking at the wrong things. You cannot convince me that a geographical breakdown of....

Iowa, Wisk, Neb + others on one side, and PSU, fOSU, and scUM on the other...

will be in any way shape or form unbalanced on the field or not effective in showcasing the leage on TV.

 

[hawkeyescott]

If your going to have protected rivals that you play every year then what the hell is the point of splitting Michigan and Ohio St and moving the game to October anyway? Sure they could have a rematch in the title game but that would have happened only 3 or 4 times in the last 17 years anyway.

Seriously would there be that much more advertisement revenue to be made if Ohio St and Michigan were playing in the title game as compared to Ohio St and Iowa or Nebraska?

 

[iHawk]

Aren't Minneapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Louis large enough markets? The answer is yes. Keep the geographic boundries.

As far as media markets (population):

East

Pennsylvania – 12,604,767
Ohio – 11,542,645
Michigan – 9,969,727
Indiana – 6,423,113

Total – 40,540,252


West

Illinois – 12,910,409
Wisconsin – 5,654,774
Minnesota – 5,266,214
Iowa – 3,007,856
Nebraska – 1,796,619

Total – 28,635,872


Clearly more TVs in the east. BUT keep in mind that, as all Nebraska fans will tell you, everyone in the USA tunes in to watch Cornhusker football; so that brings the Western Division population base up to: 307,556,550

 

[H8IAST8]

40mil to 30 mil is pretty close.

 

[Church]

As far as media markets (population):

East

Pennsylvania – 12,604,767
Ohio – 11,542,645
Michigan – 9,969,727
Indiana – 6,423,113

Total – 40,540,252


West

Illinois – 12,910,409
Wisconsin – 5,654,774
Minnesota – 5,266,214
Iowa – 3,007,856
Nebraska – 1,796,619

Total – 28,635,872


Clearly more TVs in the east. BUT keep in mind that, as all Nebraska fans will tell you, everyone in the USA tunes in to watch Cornhusker football; so that brings the Western Division population base up to: 307,556,550

LMAO.... Exactly!


Split this conference down the middle and lets get back to REAL football talk. I don't care who ends up in either division but I do think it will come to pass that historical rivalries will end up winning out over everything else. I think what Jon mentioned above about pairing teams is very likely to happen and then geographical location being the final determining factor.

Delany has to be thinking about what will happen when his amster plan comes to fruition in a few years, as well. If ND comes in wioth another eastern team then location will become an even bigger deal.... I think?

My head hurts.

 

[billdozer15]

One thing is for certain. Jamie Pollard is praying NU/UI get split into different divisions and dont play eachother annually.

 

[83Hawk]

I honestly don't understand the absolute "scUM and fOSU have to be in separate divisions". I realize that it eliminates the possiblity of an fOSU scUM title game but I think that matters.

I know this for a fact. fOSU and scUM will always be one of the biggest football games of the year when played (regardless of whether its a conf title game or a regular season) and the B10 title game will be one of the biggest football games of the year regardless of who is playing in it.

If the only reason we can't separate geographically is fOSU and scUM will be in the same division then the powers that be are looking at the wrong things. You cannot convince me that a geographical breakdown of....

Iowa, Wisk, Neb + others on one side, and PSU, fOSU, and scUM on the other...

will be in any way shape or form unbalanced on the field or not effective in showcasing the leage on TV.

Actually, I would prefer to see Iowa, Nebraska and Penn State on one side, Wisconsin, Ohio State and Michigan on the other. Sure, Penn State would have to do some traveling....they do that now anyway so I don't see the big deal. Plus, although geography was one of Delaney's criteria, it was NOT the most important. This would make more sense than splitting Michigan and Ohio State.

Sure...Michigan and Ohio State may play twice in a season every few years...buy why mess with the rivalry? Some traditions NEED to be left intact...that is part of the allure of the Big 10: tradition.

 

[H8IAST8]

To me, i think this could still lead to a geographic split.

"First priority's competitive fairness to me," Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany said last week. "Second priority is maintenance of rivalries, some of them are very important. They're part of who we are and they're not treated lightly. And then I think the third is what factor, if any, does geography play?"

OSU #1 NU #2
PSU #3 Wisc #5
UM #4 Iowa #6

But the west is more balanced. In the west, five schools have played in a combined 16 BCS bowl games since 1993. Nebraska, which joins the Big Ten in 2011, boasts the second-most conference and overall wins since 1993. Iowa and Wisconsin have winning Big Ten records over the same span and combined to play in five BCS bowls.

1993 is the base, but looking forward 5 years, whos thinks Michigan will be better than Iowa, Nebraska or Wisconsin? Anyone not named Steve Deace?

"We're all going to protect one rivalry, we've decided that and we're going right back to what we've talked about, competitive equality," Alvarez said. "If you stick with that, you can get close (to guessing the divisions)."

After scouring multiple article rivalries are talked about almost as much and competitve balance. You get geography, rivalries and a fairly competitive balance when you simply do a geographic spilt.

"We may have 15 trophy games, rivalry games that are in that same number," Delany said. "We'll need to do everything we can to preserve those. Whether or not we'll be 100 percent able to preserve every trophy game or every rivalry game ..."

Geography saves the largest majority of rivalries including the new NU-Iowa rivalry.

If it’s not a competitive setup, I think we’ll all regret it later,” Iowa Athletics Director Gary Barta said. “No. 1, let’s make sure however we set this up that it’s competitive over a long period of time. No. 2, how many of these rivalries can we protect. It became apparent to me that they all might not get protected, but it looks like we’ll get to protect almost all of them. No. 3, geographically, is there a way to take those first two and then make it make sense geographically? I think we’re getting close.”

When taking Delany’s principles in reverse order, a geographical split might have merit. Obviously, geography is solved and rivalries largely remain in place. Of the league’s 22 designated rivalries that are played annually, only two — Northwestern-Purdue, Illinois-Indiana — would be interrupted.

 

[nationalchamps]

It may not be as bad as everyone thinks if we end up in the east. Sure some of the rivalries would be gone, but the way we have owned PSU it could come down to one game every year for the division title - against OSU.

 

[garn]

It may not be as bad as everyone thinks if we end up in the east. Sure some of the rivalries would be gone, but the way we have owned PSU it could come down to one game every year for the division title - against OSU.

I would hate to see the natural rivariles done away with. The rivarlies and trophy games are one of the things that make the Big 10 unique and great and as a Husker fan, I would hate to see Nebraska being blamed for the breakup of these rivarly games.

I'm all for a true East/West split as that would appear to achieve the competive balance that Delany wants and would keep alot of the natural rivarlies intact.

 

[TwinTownHawk]

FWIW I just heard an interview with Adam Rittenberg on the local ESPN radio station. He stated that it appears Wisco will be going East.

This was NOT a report or breaking news just two guys talking and exchanging rumors.

 

[H8IAST8]

FWIW I just heard an interview with Adam Rittenberg on the local ESPN radio station. He stated that it appears Wisco will be going East.

This was NOT a report or breaking news just two guys talking and exchanging rumors.

That means Iowa loses their annual game with Wisconsin then, because you know Minnesota and the Badgers will play.