As our own Phil Miller noted during his flurry of reports from the Big Ten media convention, the conference should have its divisions for 2011 sorted out by September. That leaves roughly 45 more days of speculation as to how exactly league teams will be divided up. Our quick pick:
"West" -- Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Illinois, Northwestern.
"East" -- Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Purdue, Indiana.
Reasons: It maintains strong existing rivalries within divisions; it creates a decent balance of power, though the east would certainly be a higher-profile division; and it just seems plain logical to split that way.
Fellow Twitterererer, former colleague and professional contrarian Jeff Shelman prefers a north/south split. He is of the belief there is no way Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State wind up together. We're not so sure. In the end, of course, a ninth conference game -- which would logically mean one game against every team in your division, plus games against four of the six in the other division -- would take some of the bite out of the separation anyway.
Nevertheless, this subject seems to stir some passionate debate, so we'll throw it out there: how would you divide up the Big Ten into football divisions?
One thing about which we can all agree: a nice cabernet or chardonnay certainly goes nice on your table.
