The 2023 college football season will be a lot of things across the country and in the Big Ten. More than anything else, it will be the last year before drastic changes are made to the sport.
USC and UCLA are set to join the Big Ten in 2024, Oklahoma and Texas are on their way to the SEC and the College Football Playoff will soon balloon to 12 teams. Many smaller facets of the sport will shift when this movement happens, none more important to Wisconsin than the change in the Big Ten’s East-West division model.
The Badgers have benefitted from playing in the Big Ten West since its inception, reaching the Big Ten Championship three times in a four-year period from 2016-2019. To the dismay of many, that division model will reportedly reach its end after the 2023 season.
The Big Ten will announce its new scheduling model Thursday afternoon. The Athletic’s Nicole Auerbach reports a “Flex Protect” model is the likely outcome, with schools protecting a few rivalry games each season and cycling through the rest of the conference on a bi-annual basis.
The Big Ten will announce its new football scheduling model at 4:30pm ET on BTN on Thursday.
Multiple sources tell @TheAthletic that the "Flex Protect" model is the frontrunner. Schools would have 1, 2 or 3 protected annual rivals & cycle through everyone else. No divisions.
— Nicole Auerbach (@NicoleAuerbach) June 7, 2023
The Big Ten first changed to divisions after Nebraska joined the league in 2010. Today’s East-West model then began in 2014, aligned with the start of the four-team College Football Playoff. With more teams entering the conference and the Playoff expanding again, the conference is set to again change with the times.
For Wisconsin, that likely means a guaranteed game against Iowa, Minnesota and maybe Nebraska every season. In that scenario, the Badgers would then play every other conference foe every other season.
To me, at least, it is bittersweet to see the Big Ten West reach its end.