Big 10 Fooball Realignment

[MickeyDavis]

The new division alignments:

East - Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State and Rutgers.

West - Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue and Wisconsin.

All schools in the East Division are in the eastern time zone and all schools in the West Division are in the central time zone with the exception of Purdue.

Each school will play the other six schools in its division plus two teams from the other division in 2014 and 2015, which will serve as transitional years in which the schools will still be playing eight-game schedules.
Beginning in 2016, each school will play three teams from the other division as part of its nine-game schedule.

The cross-division games will include one protected matchup on an annual basis between Indiana and Purdue.

With the start of the nine-game conference schedule in 2016, teams from the East Division will host five conference home games during even-numbered years, while teams from the West Division will host five conference home games during odd-numbered years.

As a result of the nine-game conference schedule and the Big Ten’s schedule rotation, every student-athlete will have the opportunity to play against every other team in the conference at least once during a four-year period. The Big Ten is returning to a nine-game conference schedule for all teams for the first time since the 1983 and 1984 seasons.

“Big Ten directors of athletics met in person or by conference call six times from December to March to discuss a new Big Ten football model,” Delany said. “The level of cooperation and collaboration was reflective of what we've come to expect from this group of administrators who have worked extremely well together on a number of complex matters over the past several years. We are all looking forward to ushering in this new era of Big Ten football.”

[JayMKE]

east/west was the way it always should of been, no more legends and leaders garbage

[RiotPunch]

This is a beautiful thing. Lots of Badger/Buckeye B10 Championships in our future!!

[humanrefutation]

Already discussed in the CFB thread. Come on, MD!