Thursday, September 2, 2010

CONFERENCE DOSEY-DO UPDATE: The Big Midwest Land Grant University Conference With Twelve Teams has announced its divisional split for football:
Division 1: Michigan, Nebraska, Iowa, Michigan State, Northwestern, Minnesota

Division 2: The Ohio State University, Penn State, Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana, Illinois
Each school will have one protected out-of-division rivalry -- i.e., The Game will continue to take place on the final Saturday of the regular season.

The only geographically pure split would have been East/West, with PSU, OSU, both Michigan and both Indiana schools in one half, but that would likely have been imbalanced in terms of sports strength. So this sorta North/South-ish thing is ... interesting.

Also, Brigham Young University has broken up with the Mountain West Conference (but hopes they can still be friends) to go independent in football, West Coast Conference in other matters. In football, they've signed an eight-year deal with ESPN and an agreement to play Notre Dame six times in the next decade.

10 comments:

  1. Joseph J. Finn9:02 AM

    1.  The important rivalry game, Wisconsin and Minnesota, is still happening, right?  In that case it's all gravy.

    2.  So who do we root for; BYU, ND, or the meteorite?

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  2. Very interesting choice on BYU's part.  Given that (due to its religious influence) it has a quite fervent and nationally spread fanbase, it could legitimately make a run at getting some solid money out of it, especially if the team continues to be good.

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  3. The Pathetic Earthling9:34 AM

    Despite the fact that ND are my co-religionists, I'll root BYU on that game 99 times out of 100.  Mostly, because a ND loss makes NBC Sports cry.

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  4. MidwestAndrew11:00 AM

    But what are the names of the divisions? Tell me it won't be something like "Bo Division" and "Woody Division". So what do you call these divisions?

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  5. J. Bowman12:25 PM

    The "still care a little about academics" division and the "Hardly even pretending there's a school associated with us" division?

    Or would that be a 1-11 split?

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  6. gtv20002:40 PM

    I always thought it odd that with the exception of Wisconsin, the Big Ten schools are oddly bunched in the middle of the alphabet.

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  7. Becky3:40 PM

    <span>UW-Minn is a protected game/rivalry so it will happen every year. As a diehard UW fan, it's tough knowing we'll have to travel so much as only one school in our division is in a contiguous state. This is especially odd considering 6 of the 11 (other teams) in the conference would qualify for this statement.
    </span>

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  8. Jenn.3:58 PM

    I have to say, I'm rather with you, TPE.

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  9. Squid4:43 PM

    Ah, yes -- The Game.  We call it the "Meteor Magnet" where I come from.

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  10. Stevie10:48 PM

    Whew, that's a relief. I'm bummed as I live in Chicago and like to see games at Northwestern when they're here. Alas. Over on my Facebook, we're debating how the divisions name themselves. So far our leading contender is Corn vs. Soybeans, although Pop vs. Soda and Bubbler vs. Drinking Fountain have also earned votes.

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