Big Ten bowl record....

[Gopher]

..last four seasons..9-19, soon to be 9-20. Last five seasons, 12-22...soon to be 12-23. This is more than just a phase, it's a longer term shift. You can try to justify away anything you want, but it's reality. When will a Big Ten next win a national championship in football? We may be talking DECADES before it happens again. It's been what, ten years since the last one? The landscape of college football HAS changed...the base of power has moved away from the center-NE part of the country to the southern rim that starts in South Carolina/Georgia and ends in Los Angeles. Don't believe me, look at the last 10 years. It's a shift, not a phase.

 

[grunkiejr]

..last four seasons..9-19, soon to be 9-20. Last five seasons, 12-22...soon to be 12-23. This is more than just a phase, it's a longer term shift. You can try to justify away anything you want, but it's reality. When will a Big Ten next win a national championship in football? We may be talking DECADES before it happens again. It's been what, ten years since the last one? The landscape of college football HAS changed...the base of power has moved away from the center-NE part of the country to the southern rim that starts in South Carolina/Georgia and ends in Los Angeles. Don't believe me, look at the last 10 years. It's a shift, not a phase.

Chicken Little is that you? The last championship was January of 2003. That is 6 years ago.

College sports are cyclical. The Big Ten recently has gone through a string of 8 coaching changes in the last 5 years. Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern, Purdue, and Wisconsin all have a coach that has been in their current position for less than five years. That leaves Iowa, Ohio State, and Penn State as the only programs that have had continuity and not coincidentally they were probably the best 3 teams in the conference at the end of the season.

The AD's already recognized the problems and they made a changes. Now most of the conference is at different stages of program building and it will take time for greatness to occur. The Big Ten is recruiting at a higher level than they have in the past with 5 programs currently ranked in the top 25 classes for 2009. Ohio State and Michigan both have top 10 classes, Michigan State is on fire with a top 15 class and Penn State and Illinois are doing well. The Gophers are at 32 (going up after tomorrow when we get Carter) and Wisconsin isn't very far behind us. The conference ranks ahead of the Big 12, Pac 10, Big East, and is going back and forth with the ACC for #2 overall in recruiting (with one less team than the ACC).

It will not be decades before the conference wins another championship but I don't think anybody in the conference is going to be good enough to do it next year either.

 

[tjgopher]

The landscape of college football HAS changed...the base of power has moved away from the center-NE part of the country to the southern rim that starts in South Carolina/Georgia and ends in Los Angeles. Don't believe me, look at the last 10 years. It's a shift, not a phase.

Actually, I don't think that much has changed in the last 40 years. You have had northern teams such as Notre Dame, Penn State, Ohio State, Nebraska, Washington, and Michigan win national titles in the last four decades, but I don't think the base of power has been in the center-NE states since prior to the 1960s. College football runs deep in the south and nothing about that has changed since integration came into play the 1960s. Since then, college football has been all about Oklahoma, Texas, Alabama, Florida State, Georgia, LSU, Florida, Tennessee, Clemson, Texas A&M, Miami (FL), and if you want to extend to California, then include USC, UCLA, etc.

 

[Art Vandelay]

Blame it on OSU.

Do they deserve a BCS Bowl bid? Becuase of their fanbase, they always get an at-large selection if their BCS ranking is high enough. Sometimes, the B10 getting 2 teams in the BCS is a bad thing. Look at these likely match-ups had we got only one team in the BCS.

Rose: PSU/USC (no difference here)
Capital One: OSU vs. Georgia
Outback: MSU vs. South Carolina
Alamo: Iowa vs. Mizzou
Champs: Northwestern vs. FSU
Insight: Wisconsin vs. Kansas
Motor City: Gophers vs. Central Michigan

The B10 goes 5-2 at worst with these match-ups and their whole perception is different.

 

[GopherinPhilly]

Blame it on OSU.

Do they deserve a BCS Bowl bid? Becuase of their fanbase, they always get an at-large selection if their BCS ranking is high enough. Sometimes, the B10 getting 2 teams in the BCS is a bad thing. Look at these likely match-ups had we got only one team in the BCS.

Rose: PSU/USC (no difference here)
Capital One: OSU vs. Georgia
Outback: MSU vs. South Carolina
Alamo: Iowa vs. Mizzou
Champs: Northwestern vs. FSU
Insight: Wisconsin vs. Kansas
Motor City: Gophers vs. Central Michigan

The B10 goes 5-2 at worst with these match-ups and their whole perception is different.

Art makes a very good point...the popularity of the Big 10 around the country and with bowl organizers tends to have our teams playing one up against other conferences. Our 7 playing thier 5 and so on. With the depth of the other conferences growing since the scholarship changes, we are being outclassed in the lessor and mid majoy bowls accross the board. No question getting KU was a serious challenge for us considering the depth of the big 12...we should have been playing Central Michigan because thats where are talent and depth were.

 

[alpinegopher]

5-2? MSU would have been the only favorite for sure, maybe MN slightly over C Mich. OSU/Georgia is a pick em.

I see 3-4.

 

[EG#9]

I don't see the Big Ten going 5-2 in Art's hypothetcial matchups either. MSU obviously beats South Carolina, and I see tOSU beating Georgia. The other 5 matchups are toss ups at best or ugly mismatches at worst. I'd like the Gophers would be a favorite too, but with the way they finished the season, I couldn't give them better than a 50% chance to beat any D1 school.

 

[NateDawgUM]

Maybe the Big Ten doesn't go 5-2 but the Big Ten is almost always playing up in bowl games. Furthermore, the Big Ten almost always gets USC in January.

Anyway, who cares????????? The Big Ten is arguably the most popular conference in football (SEC can make the same argument). We're not going anywhere.

 

[Gopher]

Maybe the Big Ten doesn't go 5-2 but the Big Ten is almost always playing up in bowl games. Furthermore, the Big Ten almost always gets USC in January.

Anyway, who cares????????? The Big Ten is arguably the most popular conference in football (SEC can make the same argument). We're not going anywhere.

We're not going anywhere? The last 5 years have been tough on the Big Ten. If you take away Ohio St, the Big Ten is just plain AWFUL in football. You have to be somewhere first. It seems many Big Ten fans don't understand the status of the conference.

 

[grunkiejr]

I don't see the Big Ten going 5-2 in Art's hypothetcial matchups either. MSU obviously beats South Carolina, and I see tOSU beating Georgia. The other 5 matchups are toss ups at best or ugly mismatches at worst. I'd like the Gophers would be a favorite too, but with the way they finished the season, I couldn't give them better than a 50% chance to beat any D1 school.

Did you see Central Michigan lost to FAU?

Iowa would be Missouri too.

The Big Ten would probably be 4-3 with wins by OSU, MSU, Iowa and Minnesota.

 

[grunkiejr]

We're not going anywhere? The last 5 years have been tough on the Big Ten. If you take away Ohio St, the Big Ten is just plain AWFUL in football. You have to be somewhere first. It seems many Big Ten fans don't understand the status of the conference.

Do you think Michigan is going to stay down forever? I don't like the guy but RR built winners at WVU and it will be easier for him to do the same thing at Michigan. Now that Michigan is recruiting nationally instead of mostly midwest it will make MSU in to a much stronger program than it has been since the 1960's because Michigan prospects are now going to MSU instead of splitting between Michigan & MSU.

PSU is good and will remain good. Zook is bringing talent in to Illinois and he has to learn how to do something with it. Minnesota is in largely the same position as Illinois as Brewster is bringing in more talent to the team than in the past but it will take time to build it up and make something of it. Our special teams were much better this year and that is the first place that you start to see talent improvement on a college team because most recruits don't make an impact on D until they are in year 2-3.

I'm not sure on the direction of Purdue with their new coach. Indiana is recruiting better but their coach sucks and may not last. To me it is clear that Wisconsin is the one team that is getting worse in the conference. Iowa has been cyclical with Ferentz and he seems to be doing better coaching the talent they have on the field but their recruiting has really fallen off this year. Iowa will be good in 2009 but they may fall back in 2010 or 2011 unless they pick up their recruiting again--in 2005 or 2006 they were ranked #10 overall in the country and this year's class is presently ranked #11 in the Big Ten.

 

[cncmin]

Blame it on OSU.

Do they deserve a BCS Bowl bid? Becuase of their fanbase, they always get an at-large selection if their BCS ranking is high enough. Sometimes, the B10 getting 2 teams in the BCS is a bad thing. Look at these likely match-ups had we got only one team in the BCS.

Rose: PSU/USC (no difference here)
Capital One: OSU vs. Georgia
Outback: MSU vs. South Carolina
Alamo: Iowa vs. Mizzou
Champs: Northwestern vs. FSU
Insight: Wisconsin vs. Kansas
Motor City: Gophers vs. Central Michigan

The B10 goes 5-2 at worst with these match-ups and their whole perception is different.

Art is right, the Bowls already are set up where the Big Ten team plays a team that almost always finished at equal or higher place in their conference; but then when an extra Big Ten team is thrown into the BCS games (because of a lack of conference championship game), this drops every team down a step further, making the matchups even harder.

The Big Ten will be fine. The recruiting classes the past two years have been quite good (see OSU, Mich, PSU, Ill, Minn, Mich St., Wisc., anyway); even Indiana is picking it up in recruiting (note Iowa and Purdue falling somewhat). Anyway, as long as two Big Ten teams don't make the BCS, expect better future records. This year in particular the matchups were especially lopsided.