Big Ten Bowl Matchups

[Jake]

Haven't seen that for awhile but it still cracks me up.

If Penn State and Ohio State win the other 5 games won't matter in terms of conference rep. I'll be shocked if Iowa doesn't win, though.

I think Sparty will get smacked, but I think PSU and OSU have better shots than the 10 point lines suggest.

 

[matcar]

Well, looks like the B10 will get off the "schnied" with Iowa. MSU and PSU sucking it up. Yech.

 

[reagdog]

guess im a little less optimistic than jlb. i was really hoping tOSU would skip the bcs this year and get a shot at a team like georgia but that didn't happen. right now this lineup looks to me like it will go a little like this:

OhioState (10) vs. Texas (3) - texas close
PennState (8) vs. USC (5) - usc not even remotely close
MichiganState (18) vs. Georgia (15) - 50/50 georgia very close
Iowa (26) vs. South Carolina (39) - iowa
Northwestern (22) vs. Missouri (25) - missouri
Wisconsin (41) vs. FloridaState (28) - fsu

imo texas should be playing for the nc. while i don't have an issue with ou playing, texas to me had a better season including its lone loss. as much as i love the direction tOSU is going they just aren't nc caliber just yet. i could certainly see tOSU pull off a win, but i can't see them as anything but underdogs and i believe that to be warranted.

usc might be the best team in the nation. if they didn't play a weak ass schedule they would be playing in the nc no question about it.

scum lite to me is far too one dimensional for this game and its going to bite them. georgia is going to load the box, scum lite won't be able to run and a turnover will lead to a close georgia win.

iowa though not being very good should be plenty good enough to beat the cocks soundly.

missouri will put a hurting on a nw team that has overachieved this year.

when the hell did wisky win 6 games? i demand a recount!

this looks like it will be a tough bowl season for the big 10. i would be very happy to walk away with 3-3. though this could very easily turn into 1-5. if tOSU doesn't get a bcs bowl, the bowl match ups tend to get a little less one sided:


PennState (8) vs. USC (5)
OhioState (10) vs. Georgia (15)
MichiganState (18) South Carolina (39)
Iowa (26) vs. vs. Missouri (25) -
Northwestern (22) vs. FloridaState (28)
Wisconsin (41) vs. ... maybe they could play cal poly again?

the only lopsided game would be scum lite vrs south carolina. but honestly while i see scum lite winning that game, with their style of play i don't see it by a large margin.

Pac-10 was 5-0 in their bowl games and kicked the Big-10's butt in head-2-head competition this year.

 

[FrancisSoyer]

Worst. Bowl. Season. Ever.

 

[BUCKYLE]

Worst. Bowl. Season. Ever.

Yet if the Bucks win on Monday, it'll be my favorite bowl season since the ND Fiesta in '06.

The funny thing is, if we do beat Texas, most of the talk about the B10 being teh suck will fade. tOSU carries the banner moreso than any other team. Even co-champs PSU don't influence national perception as much as the Buckeyes.

 

[rocketman]

Yet if the Bucks win on Monday, it'll be my favorite bowl season since the ND Fiesta in '06.

The funny thing is, if we do beat Texas, most of the talk about the B10 being teh suck will fade. tOSU carries the banner moreso than any other team. Even co-champs PSU don't influence national perception as much as the Buckeyes.

I'll preface this with saying I don't care what the media thinks, but if Ohio State beats Texas we could potentially hear:

"The Big 10 wasn't really that bad. They played tough bowl opponents in close games and were underdogs in almost all of them. A few teams came close to winning and performed much better than expected."

or

"Texas was overrated. The Big 10 sucks."

I'm going to go with the latter being more probable.

 

[BUCKYLE]

I'll preface this with saying I don't care what the media thinks, but if Ohio State beats Texas we could potentially hear:

"The Big 10 wasn't really that bad. They played tough bowl opponents in close games and were underdogs in almost all of them. A few teams came close to winning and performed much better than expected."

or

"Texas was overrated. The Big 10 sucks."

I'm going to go with the latter being more probable.

I think the latter will depend on OU's showing in the NC. If they make a game out of it...or even win, then tOSU beating UT, they'd have to give us props. Not that I give a flying fuck, but I think it would force their hand.

 

[daveeb]

Man, is the Big Ten at an all-time low right now? This is just getting ugly. I am so sick and tired of Big Ten defensive coordinators running soft zone coverages against all these speedy teams. If Michigan can jam Florida's receivers with Morgan Trent, then that clearly means that man-to-man can work. This zone ridiculousness doesn't work anymore. The word "attack" needs to be in the vocabulary of each and every player on defense for the Big Ten, because attempting to contain the big play or control the line of scrimmage just doesn't cut it. Teams like USC and Florida will take 20 yard pickups all day long.

 

[matt_thatsme]

I have been thinking this for quite some time. I agree 100% and think that this soft zone coverage defense is a source of where we hear the "Big 10 is too slow to stay with (insert elite team here)." If we are in this coverage and Colt McCoy has time to throw, it could be ugly. I f*ing hate soft zone coverage.

 

[Dryden]

What is more damning of the conference is that none of the QBs in the league are talented enough to routinely hang 40+ on all the other league secondaries.

Hell, if Michigan St had a better QB they'd probably have been in the Rose Bowl. Hoyer is awful. MSU ran with Georgia at virtually every other position on the field; if Hoyer could put the ball in the same area code as his receivers MSU would have won. Northwestern was in the same boat.

I think it says a lot about the conference when Terrelle Pryor is arguably the second best QB in the league (behind Clark) and has been quoted as saying "it's easy." I'd probably have Stanzi at third right behind Pryor, which means the three best QBs in the Big Ten this year were all first year starters. Weber folded against good teams, Williams has always been overrated, and the rest of the lot is a collection of below-average game managers. Christ almighty, Curtis Painter has to be the worst QB Joe Tiller has ever produced!

 

[TheIronColonel]

The QBs definitely aren't top shelf, but outside of Iowa no Big Ten team has controlled the line of scrimmage. Penn State's O-Line didn't get pushed around, but they hardly imposed their will. Their D-Line got thoroughly handled. Our lines haven't really dominated any games this year, and only had the defensive lines start to show up in the tail end of the season (against conference opponents, so what does that tell us?).

There are problems at numerous positions, that's all I'm saying.

 

[martinss01]

There are 7 games, so one being wiped out by a meteor strike must be the surprise you have in mind.

so you watched the wisky vrs fsu game then? :p

kicked the Big-10's butt in head-2-head competition this year.

this the head to head competition your referring to:

pac 10 W
tOSU @usc 34-3

big 10 W
oregon state @penn state 45-14

pac 10 W
oregon @purdue W 32-26 (ot)

regular season point total:
pac 10 - 80
big 10 - 74

6 points in 3 games... oh and oregon vrs purdue was #2 pac 10 vrs. #9 big 10... thats 9th in the big 10, not country. if a 2 point average margin of victory and 1 out of 3 went to OT is the definition of a butt kickin well... the big 10 certainly got one.

Pac-10 was 5-0 in their bowl games

5-0 is pretty solid regardless, but to be fair they didn't exactly tap dance through a mine field of powerhouses. toughest games imo were pac 10 #2 vrs big 12 #4 and usc (best team in the country imo) vrs a mediocre penn state. not trying to take anything away from what they accomplished this year, but its not as impressive once you really sit down and look at the #'s.

don't get me wrong. id love to sit here and say what usc did against tOSU/penn state was impressive. that would mean tOSU/psu are better than they actually are. unfortunately that isn't the case. the big 10 is really down this year. 1-5 is exactly where i thought the big 10 would be at this point. usc didn't make the nc because their body of work simply didn't warrant it when compared to others. thats not usc's fault, they made what on paper looked like a really impressive schedule. unfortunately others didn't hold up their end of the bargain. ill tell ya right now id take a usc vrs florida match up over florida vrs ou in a heartbeat. this year is becoming one of the least interesting bowl seasons we've had in a while.

 

[VprHis]

Hell, if Michigan St had a better QB they'd probably have been in the Rose Bowl. Hoyer is awful. MSU ran with Georgia at virtually every other position on the field; if Hoyer could put the ball in the same area code as his receivers MSU would have won. Northwestern was in the same boat.

...despite the fact that almost half the MSU team was trying to recover from "flu-like" symptoms. How on earth did a bunch of sick, slow-ass Big Ten players run with the mighty SEC?

 

[Dryden]

...despite the fact that almost half the MSU team was trying to recover from "flu-like" symptoms. How on earth did a bunch of sick, slow-ass Big Ten players run with the mighty SEC?

Really funny how the fortunes of two conferences turned on the Oregon/Oregon St game. Had the Beavers won that game and gone to the Rose Bowl, it would have been the Pac 10 with two BCS teams, and the Big 10 with one. Now you'd have bowl matchups with Penn St drilling Oregon St (again) in the Rose, Ohio St playing Georgia, maybe Michigan St plays Missouri and Northwestern is playing Kansas, etc, etc on down the line -- all far more favorable matchups.

With each passing year I'm more and more convinced that the Big 10s bad bowl record is a badge of honor, as all it really reflects is the purchasing power of conference fans. What other conference has as many passionate fan bases willing to spend tens of millions of dollars traveling en masse an average of 1,600 miles to see their overmatched teams get clipped?

 

[Gatorubet]

With each passing year I'm more and more convinced that the Big 10s bad bowl record is a badge of honor, as all it really reflects is the purchasing power of conference fans.

My aunt said she wasn't large, just big-boned. :p