(09-23-2018 09:56 PM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  

(09-23-2018 11:00 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(09-23-2018 09:21 AM)Poster Wrote:  

(09-23-2018 06:40 AM)GE and MTS Wrote:  Penn State is a northeast and east coast school. Now that Maryland and Rutgers are in the Big Ten, Penn State has conference games where they recruit students and athletes. The Big Ten has much better brands than the ACC which gets the conference more money. The ACC should have made more of an effort back in the 70s and 80s. That could have been the difference.

Why would you invite Maryland and Rutgers to benefit just one conference member?
Especially a conference member that was just coming off the Sandusky scandal?

The only people who think that Maryland and Rutgers were good invites are Big Ten fans who feel the need to mindlessly defend what their conference does. Especially now that Comcast has dropped BTN in NYC and might drop it in NJ. The Big Ten was never able to get the BTN in Washington DC like they briefly were in NYC.

Yeah and Big 10 recruiting hasn't helped Rutgers on the football field either.

The only person (other than Rutgers fans) who should think the Big 10's invite of Rutgers was a good idea is Lovie Smith, since having a winnable conference game like Rutgers on his schedule every year might help him keep his job for longer.

Seems like since inviting Maryland and Rutgers, the B1G has been more prosperous than ever. They now make more money than the SEC.

What am i missing here?

Inviting Rutgers worked out for administrators, sure. NYC lined their pockets.

But did it work out for the fans? When I read a B1G team’s board, they often dread games with Rutgers. Trading a traditional opponent for a faraway non-entity lowers fan enthusiasm and cheapens the season ticket package.

Oh no, they have to play Rutgers instead of Purdue, Minnesota, Northwestern, Illinois and Nebraska (not a traditional opponent and farther away). I guess they may miss games with Iowa and i'm sure Wisc but with the split divisions they wouldn't be playing those western teams every year anyway.

(09-24-2018 10:24 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  In contrast, almost a quarter-century later, games involving Penn State and traditional B1G teams still do not feel like B1G games to me. This weekend's Ohio State - Penn State game will probably be a great game, but it will still have the feel of a cross-sectional game, not a B1G game.

Yeah ... I like the Penn State games, but as someone who started watching the Buckeyes when my mom was a ("non-traditional", as they say) OSU Senior who could get family tickets, with Archie Griffin breaking through the line for 5-10 yard runs and Dwight Hudson dazzling the crowd at halftime, it feels like, "hey, as a result of realignment, we get this permanent OOC series with Penn State!"

Quote: And games involving Rutgers, Maryland, and Nebraska also do not, to me at least, in any way resemble B1G games.

At least the games against Nebraska feel like Big Ten games ... a flagship Great Lakes University playing a flagship Northern Plains University ... I'm old-fashioned enough that playing Eastern schools like Penn State, Maryland or Rutgers is "even more different" to me than playing Nebraska.

And if Nebraska got kicked out of the AAU just after it got rushed into the Big Ten ... mostly because its Ag School funding is block granted and the competitive Medical School funding goes to UN-Omaha ... that's just more of the kind of annoying academic snobbery that forces the Big Ten to do all of that window dressing they do to try to set themselves apart from the football factory schools.