football scheduling

The two programs today put out press releases with several scheduling updates. Our future schedules page lives here.

Football announced a few non-conference items for 2024-2029.

• They flipped the Texas home-and-home. The 2024 game is now in Ann Arbor, and Michigan visits Austin in 2027.
• Western Michigan will be the opener again for 2026 and 2029.
• They added UTEP as a nonconference opponent in 2026.

Basketball got their Big Ten schedule for next year.

• Home-and-homes with MSU, Illinois, Purdue, Rutgers, Ohio State, Iowa, and Nebraska
• Home only vs Indiana, Wisconsin and Minnesota
• Road only vs Maryland, Northwestern, and Penn State

[We'll discuss after THE JUMP]

On WTKA yesterday I made my case for a Big Ten Showcase week to replace the Big Ten Championship. It's a very simple plan: Use Championship Weekend to play the best Big Ten games that were not played already.

The weekend after Thanksgiving, each team would play one of the four Big Ten opponents they missed during the 9-game regular season, assigned by record. Sometimes—often I suspect—the top game would remain a winner-take-all championship bout. But it would do away with rematches, could do away with the need for divisions, virtually ensure all the championship contenders got a chance to play each other, and finish the season with relatively evenly matched Big Ten games we would have otherwise missed.

Values of a good scheduling system

I came to the Showcase idea by working backwards from the things we want to accomplish in a Big Ten season. They are (in order of relative importance):

• Produce an uncontroversial Big Ten champion that has the best claim to the best season.
• Play all the important rivalries, and most of the other rivalries.
• Be fair. Contenders shouldn't have grossly different paths to their records.
• Make money. Is business.
• No rematches! (discussion at end)

The Plan

I. Big Ten Championship weekend will be replaced by Showcase games across the conference.

At the end of the regular season (IE the week after Thanksgiving) the Big Ten will host three to seven (preferably seven) games between Big Ten teams that have not yet played each other. These can be hosted on campus, or (sigh) at one or more neutral sites.

We'll have to get approved for a 13th game, but I can't see why they would allow 2 teams to do this and not the rest. If a de facto tenth conference game is an issue with the NCAA, the showcase can be chopped down to just the three best games not played, but that's less fun. More Big Ten football: good for everybody.

II. Best teams that haven't played each other play each other, and on down.

Choosing the games is actually really simple once the data (records and which games haven't been played yet) are in front of you. Let's take the 2021 season:

The best opponent Michigan hasn't played is Iowa; there's your Game 1. Ohio State already played Minnesota so they get Wisconsin, and MSU gets Minnesota. The rest fall into place with very little room for decisions (read: controversy).

In cases where there are multiple ways to organize the matchups, go with whatever makes for the best games, based on rivalries and knowledge of the specific teams in the context of that season. The Big Ten can have broad power to build the matchups that work best, so long as the results of the top game(s) will produce an undisputed champion, and there are no rematches.

Note: this leaves open an opportunity to match a #2 and #3 against each other even if one or both didn't play #1, if that's the best game not played that year. For example if #1 Michigan went 12-0, #2 OSU and #3 Iowa are both 11-2/7-2 and haven't played each other, and Minnesota is 10-3/6-3 but already played Ohio State, you're not locked into a Michigan-Iowa game that won't change the champion. Have OSU and Iowa play each other, and get your Jug on.

III. Declare a champion based on best Big Ten record/standard tiebreakers.

Once the showcase games have been played, there should be no doubt who won the Big Ten, or if there's a tie in the record, which team gets the Rose Bowl berth. The Big Ten already has tiebreaker rules in place; the Showcase game only adds information, and gives the schedulers an opportunity at the end of the season to supply what's missing.

Keeping the system in place:

1. Best conference record, determined by % of Big Ten games won.
2. If two teams are tied, head-to-head wins.
3. If three or more teams are tied, they go through a series of steps until they can get down to 2 that played each other (head-to-head wins) or 1.

IV. Hosting Options

The Showcase can be held at home sites or neutral sites. If you keep the divisional structure, the division that had four home games gets to host, and will know years in advance that they're hosting that weekend.

If you get rid of divisions, choosing who hosts adds a layer of complication. I always prefer college sites, but if they limit the Showcase to just 3 or 4 games, they'll probably want to use neutral/NFL sites so they can advertise. Not today's battle.

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Please do not mention the Star Wars. Results will be unpredictable and depressing. If Star Wars comes up try to change the subject to something like Michigan… uh… baseball? Hockey and basketball recruiting?

Bleargh. Michigan canceled a home and home with UCLA for this:

The University of Michigan Athletic Department announced Thursday (Jan. 30) the addition of the University of Connecticut to the non-conference football schedule in 2022. The Wolverines and Huskies will meet on the gridiron during the third week of the season, Sept. 17, 2022, at Michigan Stadium.

That completes a nonconference schedule of Colorado State, Hawaii, and UConn. The home schedule adds Maryland, PSU, Nebraska, Illinois, and Indiana. I really don't understand why Michigan had to cancel UCLA when they already had 7 home games. Not a great look for Warde Manuel.

Welcome to the revolution. John Gasaway on timeouts:

We already have media timeouts and multiple reviews in crunch time. That’s enough. There should be zero timeouts.

Prepare your team. Let’s see who wins.

— John Gasaway (@JohnGasaway) January 29, 2020

That's even more draconian than my proposal, which would allow timeouts if a coach shears off one of his digits and hands it to a ref. (Or, in more extreme cases, delegates an assistant to do so.) Hopefully he moderates his views slightly going forward.

[After THE JUMP: Kobe King takes are bad]