Brice Lawrence The Big 10 has made an effort in the past few years to add new teams to the conference. Before 2012, the Big 10 was host to 12 teams: Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Northwestern, Purdue, Wisconsin, and the newest member Nebraska, who officially joined on July 1, 2011 to make it an even 12. The Maryland Terrapins left the ACC and Rutgers Scarlet Knights left the Big East conference in favor of the Big 10 in late November 2012, taking the conference’s total to 14. Maryland and Rutgers will play their first Big 10 game on Nov. 29, the conference’s “Rivalry Weekend.”  While basketball will keep the same 18-game conference schedule, the change will majorly affect football. Whether or not this will add competition to the already impressive Big 10 league, the additions of these two teams will shake up the conferences. No longer will there be the Legends and Leaders divisions in football: the divisions will be renamed to East and West divisions. The East division will contain Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, and Rutgers. The West division will hold Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue, and Wisconsin. Instead of the OSU-Michigan matchup being played in separate divisions, the greatest rivalry in sports will possibly decide the champion of East division for years to come (bigten.org). |
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