The season is now hitting the home stretch in the Big Ten and in college football in general. We’re now eleven weeks into the college football season, and we have a fairly good feel about who’s in this thing, and who’s not. Michigan seems to be a bit resurgent, Ohio State and Minnesota now seem to be separating themselves, and everyone else is looking to position themselves for the postseason.
We’re here to make sense of it all, and teams like Penn State and Wisconsin are still right there for a trip to Indy.
As we do each week, here’s your Big Ten football power rankings after the latest round of games. As always, give me a break on these, I flew to Cabo in the middle of college football season. It’s beautiful, but that’s a little distracting.
14. Rutgers – (Last week 14)
A horrible season is about to get worse. Here comes big, bad Ohio State.
13. Maryland – (Last week 13)
A horrible season got worse. There went big, bad Ohio State.
12. Northwestern – (Last week 11)
It is still truly beyond me how the Wildcats are this bad. Meow.
11. Nebraska – (Last week 9)
From dark horse, to dark season. It is unlikely the children of the corn go anywhere besides home this season.
Next … 10 thru 6
10. Purdue (Last week 12)
Purdue still has an outside shot at a bowl. Like, a three-quarter court Hail-Mary blind-folded with time-expiring shot. But, there’s still that chance.
9. Michigan State (Last week 8)
The Spartans have unraveled. It might squeak into a bowl, but hardly anything makes Mark Dantonio smile. Just getting into the postseason doesn’t qualify. Come to think of it, neither does winning the Publishers’ Clearing House Sweepstakes.
8. Illinois (Last week 9)
Time to give credit where credit is due. Illinois is a much improved squad and you can now make your postseason plans Illini faithful. All thirty-four of you.
7. Iowa (Last week 6)
This season is really going about as expected in regards to Iowa standards. Beat some teams, lose to some teams, end up in a middle of the pack bowl game. All that’s missing is another Kirk Ferentz contract extension.
6. Indiana (Last week 7)
Is Indiana the most improved team in the conference? I think people are actually more excited for the football team than putting the pumpkin through the hoop this year. That’s right — Indiana, basketball school.
Next … 5 thru 1
5. Michigan (Last week 5)
The Wolverines are better than we thought, but not as good as everyone is building them up to be now that Jimmy boy has gone on a two-game winning streak. Notre Dame might be the only program the media loves to jump on the backs of more than the Maize and Blue.
4. Wisconsin (Last week 3)
Don’t look now, but with a hard-fought win over Iowa, the Badgers are still sitting right there just waiting for the row boat to spring a leak.
3. Penn State (Last week 2)
We are … er — We were. The Penn State faithful were puffing their chests out after making into the top four of the initial College Football Playoff Rankings. Then they all remembered it’s hard to have nice things in Happy Valley. Thud.
2. Minnesota (Last week 3)
There’s not much more to say than we were wrong. Minnesota is getting better and better and it has everything to do with the five cans of energy drinks a day P.J. Fleck has brought to the table. Belief can start to make a lot of special things happen, and the Gophers now have the inside track to Indy out of the West.
1. Ohio State (Last week 1)
I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that Ohio State will be the first team to hang 73 points on an opponent and drop in the College Football Playoff Poll. There is a ground-swell of support to move LSU up to No. 1, and I think it’s going to happen. If so, that means resume matters more than common sense, but it’s not really worth arguing with. The Buckeyes still look like the best team in the country.
Contact/Follow us @BuckeyesWire on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Ohio State news, notes and opinion.
