Wisconsin ran over Nebraska 70-31 in the Big Ten championship game.
Therefore a team that is 4-4 conference and 8-5 overall faces Stanford in the Rose Bowl. I think the Stanford Band will make a mockery of the Badgers.
In the Leaders Division Ohio State (8-0) 12-0 and Penn State (6-2) 8-4 site at home in the penalty box.
In the Legends Division Nebraska (7-1) 10-3, Michigan (6-2) 8-4 and Northwestern (5-3) 9-3 sit and wonder who wants us now.
During the season Wisconsin lost to Oregon State, Nebraska, Michigan State, Ohio State and Penn State. It all came down to just 60 minutes of football. Just ask Georgia, they needed but did not get 60 minutes 10 seconds of football.
I am not a fan of oversize conferences because there is not really any real engagement with the other half, making it hard without face to face to determine who is best. As the conferences move from 12-14-16 I see a push for disional/conference playoff tournaments, B-2 @ A-1 and A-2 @ B-1, then a championship game at a neutral site.
I think a conference should be 8-10 teams, period.
I once thought there was sanity in the NCAA Football Championship Series, with a multi round playoff. This year changed my mind. For some reason the FCS tournament is limited to 20 teams, 10 League Champions and 10 at large. A 5 round tournament opens itself to 32 teams, or 24 if you want only 8 byes on round one, but the NCAA chose 20. This year my Lehigh went 10-1 but did not win the Patriot League, Colgate at 8-3 did. There were no undefeated FCS teams this year and only 4 with a 10-1 record. Teams with 7-4 records got in as League champions and at large bids went down to 8-3 teams but Lehigh sat at home. Better than the BCS but not perfect either.
With the Eagles completely at the bottom, Lehigh and Penn State going nowhere, the football season is completely over for me. There may be football games on TV as background noise, but all I have left for the Holidays, is great family, great food and sufficient drink. 🙂
Paul in PA
They need to drop the first TWENTY bowl games scheduled. They are only there for the TV scheduling and are completely unneccessary. The Gdam bowl, belch bowl, burger bowl, pizza bowl, muffler bowl etc ad nauseum. Let these students go back and catch up on their studies. 😐 yea right..
Have a happy and safe holidays in PA.
There may be football games on TV as background noise, but all I have left for the Holidays, is great family, great food and sufficient drink
It's like my dad (who was a lonetime high school teacher and coach, played college sports and helped coach a bit in college) said to me: "The dirtest business there is is college sports."
I don't invest much into it. It's such a creepy part of American life.
for once I agree
I think a conference should be 8-10 teams, period.
The BIG 10 should just drop Penn State and whoever else is tagging along and go back to their roots.
Andy, I Can Agree With That
With the upcoming addition of Rutgers and Maryland to the Big 10 we will almost never see the other half of the conference, no matter who they are. Theses Nationwide Conferences may be OK for football and basketball, but they add tremendous expenses to all the lesser sports.
The Coach who will remane nameless wanted to create a Big East Conference long before PSU joined the Big 10. It would have included Rutgers, Boston College, Syracuse, Temple, Pitt and West Virginia. I cannot recall if Maryland was already in the ACC but Penn State played them very regularly. But the pollsters kept telling Penn State that those were not worthy opponents. Once Penn State joined the Big Ten they lost PSU as a regular opponent and more or less formed the Big East in Self defense. Then the better teams started getting picked off.
I think the conferences are now looking for new in conference patsies to bolster up the records of a very few teams. Some got some very big surprises this year, which made for better football.
On a year in and year out basis, I do not believe there can be more than 64 quality teams in 8 regional conferences. There should be a mid level group of conferences, which would help, the profit of the slightly smaller schools, some of whom are shorting everything else for football.
Paul in PA
> There may be football games on TV as background noise, but all I have left for the Holidays, is great family, great food and sufficient drink
>
> It's like my dad (who was a lonetime high school teacher and coach, played college sports and helped coach a bit in college) said to me: "The dirtest business there is is college sports."
>
>
> I don't invest much into it. It's such a creepy part of American life.
Wrong! The dirtiest business is the Oil Business by a land slide.
With these goofy conferences all the more reason for a national playoff system. Make 5 pools of 16 teams each. 1st 16 seeds, 2nd 16 seeds, FCS, Division 2 and Division 3. All 16 team pools, play championships on New Years Day.
