[NU Sports] Think BIG, Big Ten!

[SjT (Stephen J. Truog)]

Not sure if I've mentioned this before in years past on expansion, but one idea that definitely would be different would be to think big with expansion. Adding just one team (we already have a Big XII) doesn't work unless it's ND -- it just spreads out the league, leads to unbalanced schedules, etc.

But keep it the Big Ten, just with the east and west divisions (think of them as the AFC and NFC with no interconference play) of 10 teams each!

Big Ten East: Michigan, MSU, Indiana, Purdoo, OSU, Cincy, PSU, Pitt, Syracuse, Rutgers (maybe poach BC from the ACC and save them travel miles instead?)

Big Ten West: NU, Ill-noise, Wisky, Minny, Iowa, Iowa St., Nebraska, Mizzou, Kansas, K-State

Each team plays nine league games and three outside of the league.

You'd have a title game that's guaranteed not to be a rematch, you'd preserve most of the rivalries (sorry brown jug), you'd actually cut on travel costs (no PSU-Minny trips) and the TV markets of the northeast and midwest would be locked up for the Big Ten. Plus you'd all but guarantee two B(C)S bids annually and get some good football schools, basketball powers and academic institutions.

The Big XII north teams would bolt because they already see the Big XII as Texas-centric and the Big East teams might welcome the step up in prestige (maybe not for hoops, but for all else).

Yeah, it's a pipe dream :) ... but if we're going to expand, 12 is a bad number because it just mucks everything up - too big for round robin, too small for even scheduling and it's been done. Think BIG, Delaney!

Plus we'd be numerically correct again.:)

GO CATS!!!
-SjT

PS - It's final exam week ... it drives us all a little crazy!:)

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STEPHEN J. TRUOG
sjtruog at yahoo.com
GO CATS!!!