2010 Big Ten Preview

> Check out the entire 2010 College Football Preview

The headlines about the Big Ten certainly are different this year. After enduring the jabs and insults that accompanied tough postseason showings from 2006 through 2008, the Big Ten emphatically got the monkey off of their collective back with a strong bowl result. The league’s 4-3 record featured four wins against top 15 opponents, a 1-1 record against the rival SEC and BCS Bowl victories over the champions of the Pac Ten and ACC! With such a powerful close to the season, a lot of pundits declared that the Big Ten was the 2nd best conference in the country in 2009 and the league happily sailed into an offseason devoid of insults.

But after the league showed it still had plenty of muscle on the field, the conference flexed its extremely powerful off-field power and ushered in a frenzy of expansion as potential realignment became the hot topic of the summer. The Big Ten sat back as the Big XII began to fracture and then in one deft swoop then snapped up historical powerhouse Nebraska. The Cornhuskers begin play in the Big Ten next fall and they’ll bring one of the true ‘name’ programs in college football to the conference of Woody and Bo, along with a team that is a bonafide National Championship contender. With Nebraska’s impending arrival, things have never looked better for the Big Ten.

That sentiment is especially magnified when the quality and quantity of returning talent in the league comes into focus. The Big Ten had four teams win ten games last fall and the league is widely considered to be as deep as any point in the last decade. With three potential top ten teams and a host of other contenders, the 2010 Big Ten campaign will be fascinating to watch.

But for every winner, there is a loser and this year’s unfortunate team is the Illinois Fighting Illini. After slogging through two shockingly disappointing seasons, most people expected Ron Zook to lose his job. However, the man who is a virtuoso recruiter but inept coach managed to hang on for another season and that’s going to drag down a program that has a lot of talent. Expect Zook’s final season in Champaign to culminate with a last place finish.

Ahead of the Illini, there are four teams that are tightly clustered and predicted to finish with 2-6 conference records. Purdue, Minnesota and Michigan all fell just short of a bowl game last season, while Indiana endured a rebuilding season. This fall, Indiana should ride a very favorable non-conference schedule to a bowl game, though they’re going to need to pull at least one upset in league play. Purdue is also another team that is on the verge of a breakthrough season and new quarterback Robert Marve will be the catalyst for a return to postseason action.

On the other side of the coin, Minnesota will face a tough schedule that includes a visit from Southern Cal and that combined with their defensive inadequacies will drop them out of bowl contention for the first time in two seasons. Then there’s Michigan. Maligned Head Coach Rich Rodriguez is in full-on survival mode this fall after two terrible seasons in charge and things were only made more difficult by an NCAA investigation that resulted in the first major violations in school history. With a more challenging schedule and a poor defense, Rodriguez will be lucky to get to a bowl game. I’m afraid that this season will be his last in charge of the Wolverines.

The next team up is the plucky Northwestern Wildcats, who have evolved into a quality mid-level team under Pat Fitzgerald, which is appropriate because I’m predicting them to finish in the middle of the league with a 4-4 record. Expect a better running game from a team that is a good bet to go bowling for the 3rd straight season.

In the top half of the league, Michigan State and Penn State are going to be dangerous opponents for everyone they face this fall, but for vastly different reasons. Michigan State boasts the conference’s best passing game and they can score points in bunches. Meanwhile, Penn State is going to have some serious issues at quarterback, but the rest of the team should be as tough as ever. While both teams are predicted to finish 5-3 in league play, MSU gets the nod for 4th place thanks to a more favorable schedule and a head to head victory at the end of the year.

Then there are the top three teams, all of whom are highly ranked in the preseason and National Championship contenders. Wisconsin is the league’s most veteran team and features a powerful running game, a balanced offense and good defense. Iowa is coming off of an Orange Bowl victory over Georgia Tech and should have a much-improved offense to compliment their elite defense. Finally, Ohio State has won a share of the last five conference championships and has the fewest holes of any National Championship contender in the country. But Wisconsin has the misfortune of playing OSU and Iowa in back to back weeks and that tough lineup coupled with a worrisome D-Line leads me to pick them to finish 3rd in the conference and foil their championship dreams.

This means that the Big Ten will come down again to Ohio State and Iowa. After an overtime game between these two teams decided the championship in 2009, many observers have been predicting a rematch for all the marbles this fall. And I think that both teams will oblige. Ohio State is stacked on both sides of the football and their running game should be the decisive factor in a tough road victory against Wisconsin. Meanwhile, Iowa should pick off the Badgers the next week and set up the titanic clash in November. This time, I think that both teams will enter the game undefeated, making the de facto Big Ten Championship a play-in for the BCS title game. In the end, I believe that Ohio State’s superior athleticism and the playmaking skills of star quarterback Terrelle Pryor will carry the day and send the Buckeyes to the National Championship Game. But don’t despair, Iowa fans: An 11-1 finish will still mean your first trip to the Rose Bowl in 20 years.

But what about Ohio State and their well-documented failures in the BCS Championship Game in 2006 and 2007? While it seems like a lot of people seem to forget that Ohio State won the National Title game in 2002, there’s no doubt that the final stigma to be erased is the collective memory of their flops against Florida and LSU. If you want to talk about the 2009 bowl season getting the monkey off of the Big Ten’s collective shoulders, then the 2010 bowl season will officially put the Buckeyes’ championship struggles to rest, as Ohio State is my pick to win the BCS Championship this fall with an undefeated 13-0 record.

This season will truly be a year to remember in the Big Ten. Read each school’s individual preview by clicking below!

• 1) Ohio State (8-0)

• 2) Iowa (7-1)

• 3) Wisconsin (6-2)

• 4) Michigan State (5-3)

• 5) Penn State (5-3)

• 6) Northwestern (4-4)

• 7) Purdue (2-6)

• 7) Michigan (2-6)

• 7) Indiana (2-6)

• 7) Minnesota (2-6)

• 11) Illinois (1-7)
  

Matt Baxendell is collegesports-fans.com’s college football guru. He has an opinion on every team, even lowly Western Kentucky, so feel free to email him at matt.baxendell@gmail.com if you want to talk football, comment on an article, get added to his mailing list or just feel like telling him how foolish he for thinking that WKU is in for another terrible season.