Kozlo: Michigan State football should be realigned to Big Ten West

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per Kozlo:

The Big Ten has a big divisional balance issue. So how would it go about fixing it? Simple, by moving Michigan State football to the Big Ten West.​

The Big Ten has a big division balancing issue, and it is very evident that the East is much stronger than the West. But, in a lot of scenarios that people come up with, it doesn’t always help balance because Michigan, Ohio State, and Michigan State football are all playing in the same division.

Why should Michigan State be the one to move?​

For starters, it would make the most sense for the Spartans to be the one on the move. One reason is, besides Indiana, Michigan State is the western-most out of the schools in the East division. So geographically, it would make the most sense. Because, as stated before, you have to move one of Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, or Penn State in order to get some balance.

Secondly, I don’t think the conference would want to break up Ohio State and Michigan since every year it is one of the most-watched games in college football so breaking it up would not make a lot of sense. Now yes, you could do cross-division play which I will get into in a moment but if you were to do that the game would not mean as much in the long run as it does now.

That being said, if the Spartans do get moved, I believe there still should be the yearly Michigan State versus Michigan game just to keep the long historic rivalry alive. It’s still a big rivalry that a lot of people would love to see but that is mainly for the people in the state of Michigan compared to nationally; Michigan versus Ohio State would be the better two schools to keep together.

spartanavenue.com

Michigan State football should be realigned to Big Ten West

The Big Ten has a big divisional balance issue. So how would it go about fixing it? Simple, by moving Michigan State football to the Big Ten West.
spartanavenue.com spartanavenue.com

Go Gophers!!
 


This article is based on the ridiculous premise that the East is stronger than the West. The win totals and crossover games don't back that up, just the perception.

Purdue would be the likely team going East, but they lost decisively to MSU this year so not sure how that "fixes" much. That game is a perfect example of how West teams with similar results are mostly perceived as less prestigious, even though the week-in, week-out reality is much more competitive.
 

Not a terrible idea, but seems one division is more likely. Question then is do they move Michigan vs Ohio state off the last game of the season?
 

The natural team to trade Michigan state for is Purdue.

And guess what, that would misalign divisions even more as Purdue kicked Michigan state booty this year
 


MaxyJR1 said:
Not a terrible idea, but seems one division is more likely. Question then is do they move Michigan vs Ohio state off the last game of the season?
Click to expand...
One division is flat stupid.
One division cost the big 12 a playoff spot this year
 


Six to Eight said:
Seems that the supposed divisional imbalance exists because there is only one Ohio State.
Click to expand...
Let’s go:
Big ten Buckeye Division
Ohio state
Indiana
Purdue
Northwestern
Illinois
Rutgers
Maryland

Big ten balance division:
Michigan
Michigan state
Wisconsin
Iowa
Minnesota
Nebraska
Penn state


top division wins the title 85% of the time. How many years until we have to rebalance?


Honestly I don’t know how the process works but the entire big ten west, Ohio state, and Michigan should never vote to change the divisions.

the east sucks at the bottom. Assuring Ohio state and Michigan of top 4 division finishes almost every year and that their game is going to be for the division at least half the time.
the big ten west is good for everyone in the west.


the following teams are hurt by divisional alignment:
Michigan state
Penn state
Maryland
Rutgers
Indiana

But Penn state is the reason we have stupid Maryland and Rutgers so F those guys.
 

Some guy said:
One division is flat stupid.
One division cost the big 12 a playoff spot this year
Click to expand...
No, Big12 lost spot because they didn’t have a good enough team And the marquee team lost.
 





fmlizard said:
This article is based on the ridiculous premise that the East is stronger than the West. The win totals and crossover games don't back that up, just the perception.

Purdue would be the likely team going East, but they lost decisively to MSU this year so not sure how that "fixes" much. That game is a perfect example of how West teams with similar results are mostly perceived as less prestigious, even though the week-in, week-out reality is much more competitive.
Click to expand...
Yup, I see this fallacy perpetuated constantly...most recently in the PSU forum I was scanning last week during bowl speculation. I was tempted to register just to post the divisional crossover records, but it's a waste of time. The East teams will believe what they want. There is no balance issue. It just so happens the very BEST team in the league has mostly been in the East...but top to bottom the divisions are fairly equal.
 

Balance is what they were trying to achieve with the original Leaders and Legends divisions. Not bad but the complaining abiut the names were drowned out by the grumbling about geography.

LEGENDS: Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern

LEADERS: Illinois, Indiana, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, Wisconsin
 



LOL MSU. How soon they forget. I think we are all better off with MSU and PSU (i.e. the institutional OFFENDERS), in the same division).
 

MSU lost to Purdue MSU needed special teams blunder from Nebraska to beat them
 

Some guy said:
One division is flat stupid.
One division cost the big 12 a playoff spot this year
Click to expand...
14 team would be better because you’re more likely to get the two top ranked teams. Big 12 screws itself by not having more teams and playing round robin.
 

alchemy2u said:
No, Big12 lost spot because they didn’t have a good enough team And the marquee team lost.
Click to expand...
The marquee team had to win the conference twice.
Maybe we should make Michigan beat Ohio state Again
 

MaxyJR1 said:
14 team would be better because you’re more likely to get the two top ranked teams. Big 12 screws itself by not having more teams and playing round robin.
Click to expand...
Yeah that’s true.
If you don’t have divisions you have to schedule like you do anyways so that you can’t have 3 unbeatens at the end
 

Iceland12 said:
Balance is what they were trying to achieve with the original Leaders and Legends divisions. Not bad but the complaining abiut the names were drowned out by the grumbling about geography.

LEGENDS: Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern

LEADERS: Illinois, Indiana, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, Wisconsin
Click to expand...
If they called it the north and the south and flopped Nebraska and wisconsin it wouldn’t have been bad

but the legends would be way better minus Ohio state
 

I would redo the divisions every year. After the season put them in order 1-14. Odds on one division, evens in another. Try to keep rivalry games as much as possible as crossovers. Too bad the schedule is out like 8 years ahead though.
 

It goes in cycles, the West just needs another team to reach the Iowa/Wisconsin level. To get an Ohio State equivalent would require Notre Dame to join the West.
 

goldengophers said:
It goes in cycles, the West just needs another team to reach the Iowa/Wisconsin level. To get an Ohio State equivalent would require Notre Dame to join the West.
Click to expand...
If Notre dame played in the west they would be a very different team.
Their 11-1 is probably a 9-3 team in the west.
Probably a 9-3 team in the east too tbh
 

Leaders and Legends 2.0

Everyone hated Leaders and Legends….

There is more to college football than transient power balance.

Geographic rivalries are more important if you want to attract fans.
 

East/West split works well, I wouldn't change it.

But if we do, it needs to be into the pod system (3 permanent rivals, everyone else rotates)
 

Zeppelin Gopher said:
East/West split works well, I wouldn't change it.

But if we do, it needs to be into the pod system (3 permanent rivals, everyone else rotates)
Click to expand...
1 Division 8 games and top 2 go to Indy.

3 Rivals and 5 rotating

MN Could be Iowa, Wisconsin and Nebraska for example. Two year cycles.

1st Year
At WI
Home to Iowa
At NE
3 Home and 2 Away (Pur, @NW, @OSU, MSU, @Rut)

2nd Year
home to WI
At Iowa
home to NE
2 Home and 3 Away (@Pur, NW, OSU, @MSU, Rut)

3rd Year
At Wi
Home to Iowa
At NE
3 Home and 2 Away (@MICH, PSU, Ill, @IN, Mary)

4th Year
home to WI
At Iowa
home to NE
2 Home and 3 Away (MICH, @PSU,@Ill, IN, @Mary)


You would play everyone twice over 4 year period and your rivals 4 times. Add back a Non-Conference game and Play 1 PAC 12 and 1 ACC team and two G5 teams.
 

Much better solution:

get rid of divisions.


Play an 8-game conference schedule, with each team getting 3 locked in opponents every year, and then the rest of the 10 teams they rotate through home/home every 4 years.

Pick the best two with objective criteria, for the CCG. Worked out perfectly for the Big XII this year.
 

As others have said, changing divisions or eliminating divisions fixes none of this. When you have tOSU and then everybody else, it will always look unbalanced. If there were no divisions, tOSU is winning just as many conference titles as they have with divisions. They're probably just beating a different team at the end of the year to do it. It only looks bad this year, because it's the ONE year tOSU didn't get to the championship game and then Iowa has to go and get blown out.

For all the people that ignore the crossover records and keep banging the "east it vastly superior to the west" drum, you could look at it and say, "if the east is so superior, why are you sending the same team to the championship game every year?"

And an extra good chuckle to the MSU writer that apparently thinks MSU is the straw that stirs the drink in the east. The last 5 years, their record is 36-22 (with two 10-win seasons sprinkled in). The Gophers is 34-23. Yep, you'll fix everything MSU!
 

I think one of the main reasons it feels unbalanced to some is that Nebraska has not been good the last few years. If they were still a 8-10 win team every year things would look different
 


This whole concept that decisions are issue is a farce. They’re just fine based on cross over records. Should the entire SEC realign because Bama is better than everyone else in terms of resources and investment?
 

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