Big Ten Expansion

As most folks are already aware (assuming they are sports fans) the Big Ten Conference is expanding.  Starting with the 2011 season, the Big Ten will go to twelve teams with the addition of Nebraska.  The Big Ten has now announced the new “divisions” they will use moving forward.  They haven’t named the divisions yet but one division will have Michigan, Nebraska, Iowa, Michigan State, Northwestern and Minnesota while the other division will have Ohio State, Penn State, Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana and Illinois.  

The Big Ten does plan to have a half dozen standing cross-divisional football rivalries played each season, including the Ohio State – Michigan as the end of the season for at least the next two years.  The other standing “rivalry” games will be Illinois/Northwesten, Indiana/Michigan State, Penn State/Nebraska, Purdue/Iowa, and Wisconsin/Minnesota.

Now looking at that roster of “rivalries,” there are obviously a couple of them that would fit the definition of contrived.  Especially the Penn State/Nebraska and Indiana/Michigan State games.  It is doubtful that any long time football fans would place those games anywhere near their personal top 100 “rivalry” football games.  Rivalry games are the games where the fans of the loser go take out their frustrations on the coach/star player/officiating/fill-in-the-blank by taking a nine iron or baseball bat to their garage door and hope that the garage door repairman is not a fan of the rival team.

Rivalry games such as The Ohio State – Michigan game are the types of rivalry games that have been played for decades and this game has historically ended the Big Ten regular season.  But it is fairly obvious that the Big Ten is hopeful of getting a second Ohio State – Michigan game as part of the divisional alignment.  Of course, by attempting this, the Big Ten will actually de-value the regular season game.

The Big Twelve Conference, when it first expanded to twelve teams, is rumored to have had the same thinking by placing Oklahoma and Nebraska in opposite divisions and those two teams never have met in the Big Twelve Championship game.  The Pac-10 (soon to be Pac-12) Conference will be setting out their divisional line-ups soon, although they probably won’t have any splits quite like placing Ohio State – Michigan in opposite divisions.

All these conference expansions are geared to one thing and one thing only.  Money.  They’ve seen the Southeastern Conference expansion from a few years ago lead to increases in television rights fees and want in on the money.  They really do not care about the fans who take out the frustrations on the garage door after the loss in the Big Game.