Big Ten expansion

Light day today as I just got back from a hospital tour and have to spend the rest of the day catching up on all the work I usually do in the AM. But, big news: The Big Ten is officially thinking about expanding. Except that it's not big news. At all.

Maybe it's because I've expected the Big Ten to expand sooner or later, but yesterday's announcement that the Big Ten has decided to start discussing adding a 12th team is a completely useless bit of information because it is a) something I assume would happen; b) entirely speculative and makes absolutely no promises about whether or not they might actually do it; and c) doesn't give us any indication as to who the new team might be.

If this does end up materializing, that would be a seismic shift in the Big Ten landscape and eventually end up establishing a championship game and divisions and etc. It takes into account not only football, but also basketball, and any of the other major sports that would be affected. Unfortuantely, this change is, at best, four years off given the way teams schedule and the coordination involved. Frankly, in you're in favor of the expansion--and I think just about everyone is--the most realistic thing you're likely to see is the announcement of what programs are completely out of consideration. And if we're really lucky, we'll get an announcement of who it will be within the next 18 months. But this probably won't happen.

Long story short, you shouldn't be very interested in this until such a time comes when something actually materializes. Until then, MGoBlog has a pretty thorough list of potential teams that I can't really top or add to. So read it.