Urban Meyer can’t help but think given the Big Ten’s recent expansion of four teams, that the pathway for teams competing to get into the Big Ten Championship Game has gotten increasingly difficult.
With the increased talent level in the Big Ten comes some serious questions about if the conference is now squeezing out the middle-tier teams and has become too top-heavy. USC and Oregon have consistently been ranked programs over the past decade and are often College Football Playoff contenders. UCLA is a historically strong program as is Washington.
In an appearance this week on Colin Cowherd’s show on FS1, former Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer talked about the fallout of the suddenly deep Big Ten. Meyer doesn’t just feel for the fans of programs that might now get shut out of the conference championship picture, but also the coaches of these programs.
“How about the coaches? All of a sudden now the Big Ten West – you had Iowa, you had Wisconsin, you had a Minnesota -those teams all compete for a chance to go to the championship game -Northwestern went to the championship game,” Meyer said on ‘The Herd.’
“If they eliminate divisions, and you add Oregon, Washington, UCLA, USC, you know what happens to the Wisconsins? What happens to the Michigan States? What happens to those teams that are really good programs, but they’re just a notch below? Do they drop even further below in the conference? Now those are the questions that if I’m a coach at one of those places. If they eliminate divisions. What chance do I have of getting my program to the Big Ten Championship Game, which is everyone’s goal? Because it just got a hell of a lot harder.”
Meyer is now a college football analyst with Fox Sports. he was 83-9 in seven seasons as head coach of Ohio State (and won the 2014 national championship with the Buckeyes).
With the addition of Oregon and Washington, the Big Ten now stands at 18 teams. There is speculation that the conference could add two more teams and potentially add targets from the East Coast, in particular ACC programs.
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