Sept. 1, 2010

2011-12 Big Ten Schedules

PARK RIDGE, Ill. - The Big Ten Conference office announced football division alignments beginning with the 2011 season as recommended by conference directors of athletics and reviewed and supported by the Big Ten Council of Presidents/Chancellors. Nebraska will officially begin conference competition in 2011, giving the Big Ten 12 football programs for the first time in conference history.

The winner of each Big Ten division will meet in the inaugural Big Ten Football Championship Game, to be played December 3, 2011, at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. The championship game will determine the Big Ten Champion and the conference's participant in the Rose Bowl Game or Bowl Championship Series National Championship Game.

The Big Ten football division alignments will include a division featuring Illinois, Indiana, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue and Wisconsin, and a division featuring Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska and Northwestern. Each school will play the other five schools within its division and will also face three teams from the other division, including one cross-division matchup guaranteed on an annual basis. The guaranteed cross-division matchups are Illinois-Northwestern, Indiana-Michigan State, Ohio State-Michigan, Penn State-Nebraska, Purdue-Iowa and Wisconsin-Minnesota. Names for each Big Ten football division will be announced at a later date.

"Over the past several months, Big Ten staff and directors of athletics have met on several occasions to discuss and finalize division alignments," said Big Ten Commissioner James E. Delany. "We focused on competitive equality, traditional rivalries and geography. We considered multiple models and countless permutations in an effort to achieve the most competitively balanced divisions while at the same time respecting our traditions, preserving existing rivalries, and creating opportunities for the establishment and growth of new rivalries. We have listened to the feedback from our institutions, alumni and fans, and while we understand that no final alignments could possibly satisfy all of our constituents, we believe that we have achieved a very exciting result."

"I want to acknowledge the hard work of Commissioner Delany, the athletic directors at the member institutions and the Big Ten office staff to develop both the Conference alignment plan, and the 2011 and 2012 football schedules," Michigan State University President Lou Anna K. Simon said. "They worked tirelessly to arrive at solutions based on the core criteria of competitive equality, maintaining traditional rivalries and geography; values which I support. Their research and scenarios were extensive and exhaustive, and in the end they arrived at a plan that best positions our great conference for the future."

"You had 12 athletic directors sitting in a room and it was a process where each one of us was looking out for the best interest of our individual institutions, but also working with the best interests of the Big Ten at heart," MSU Athletics Director Mark Hollis said. "You have to give credit to Commissioner Delany and his staff for bringing facts forward, whether it be on the traditional rivalries, geography or competitive equality. As a result, we were able to come up with a balanced divisional breakdown.

"During the meeting, there were some conversations about some issues that people felt very strongly about. There were others where we had a preference on where we wanted to go. An example of that is I wanted to keep Michigan State in Chicago, which meant a game against Northwestern. I think that's important to our University, as it is to a lot of other universities. To be able to take our fans and our team into that major market is important. We wanted to play Michigan for a divisional title; Michigan wanted to play us for a divisional title. And that gave us an opportunity to be in the same division. We looked at the Penn State game, one that's important to both of us, but there were some things each school had to give up in order to receive some other benefits.

"As an AD, you start to get anxious, thinking you have a tough schedule. But then you look at everyone's schedule and realize they're all difficult. From a recruiting perspective, it's a benefit to all of our programs. You want to see those big match-up games. Every week as you go through the schedule, you're going to see a big rivalry game; you're going to see a national game. It's going to create a lot of excitement leading up to the last few weeks of the season, as teams are jockeying for divisional titles. It's the kind of league that kids want to play in - you want to play in those big games."

With the division alignments finalized, the Big Ten also announced updated conference schedules for the 2011 and 2012 football seasons.

The 115th season of Big Ten football kicks off Thursday, Sept. 2, as Indiana hosts Towson, Minnesota plays at Middle Tennessee State, and Ohio State welcomes Marshall. The conference's other eight teams open action on Saturday, Sept. 4.