Big Ten Board (Beta)

Steve, there's no nice way to say it so I'll be frank: The Big Ten looks like dog excrement. I'm sort of glad we proved it in weeks two and three instead of waiting until the bowl season this year. With the daunting bowl schedule the Big Ten typically has (Rose bowl vs. Pac 12 champ, 3 New Years Day games against SEC teams, Insight Bowl vs. improved middle of the road Big 12 teams, etc.), plus the ineligibility of Ohio State and Penn State, plus Wisconsin looking like garbage without Bielema's former assistants, plus MSU starting a quarterback who folds under pressure like an accordian, do you think it's possible we finish the bowl season winless as a conference? Has that ever happened before?

Steve, Braxton Miller is starting to get a bit of early Heisman hype. So far, his numbers are pretty good, averaging just over 200 yards a game through the air and 125 yards a game on the ground. Is this just a product of bad competition? Do you think he'll continue to dazzle when the Big Ten schedule opens or will he fizzle out against tougher competition (like Denard Robinson the last few years)?

I don't understand why Northwestern is not in the Top 25 poll? They are undefeated and have played a tougher schedule than OSU and many other D-1 teams.

How do you see Northwestern's season ending up from here on out?

Who shoulds start at Quarterback on Saturday for Wisconsin? Joel Stave or Danny O'Brien?

Alright Mr. Steve Helwagen, let's talk hoops (since you were so kind as to drop in on my chat as well).

I'm quite interested in Ohio State, and you would be the man to talk to on that. Obviously a lot of production gone, with William Buford and Jared Sullinger out the door. So my question comes in a few parts:

1) Is Aaron Craft capable of stepping up his scoring production without sacrificing other parts of his game, like his defense and his distribution? Also, can he be that efficient offensively that it would be worth it, or is he a guy who you'd rather have scoring less but focusing more on his strengths?

2) Can Deshaun Thomas be THE guy, without being the guy who shoots too much or disrupts the offense? Obviously he's a great scorer and shot maker, but can he play in a role more central to his team's success than just scoring the ball, maybe with some of the same impact as William Buford, in being a guy who can score but isn't harmful in doing so most of the time?

3) I guess the public perception of Ohio State is that they didn't really replace Sullinger/Buford with headliners like usual — Sullinger and Thomas followed Mullens and Buford, who followed Koufos and Turner, who followed Oden and Conley and Cook. But the 2011 recruiting class was deep, certainly, and it always seems like Thad Matta likes to keep his rotations short anyway, so there wasn't going to be much room for guys like LaQuinton Ross, Amir Williams, etc. Is that group ready to step into a bigger collective role, or do too many of those guys have proving to do before they can be counted on at this level.

Phew. That was long, forgive me.

If it's Northwestern-Purdue in the Big Ten championship game, predict the attendance at Lucas Oil Stadium.

I've got 32,389. At least both fan bases won't have to drive very far!

Hello everybody, great to be here today!!! I hope to get into a weekly routine of doing this and may do one on a Thursday night as well at some point. I will go back to the beginnning and start from there. Please add any questions you may have as replies here.

I don't think winless has ever happened, at least in last 20 years. they went like 2-5 a year or 2 ago, which was terrible. You are spot on that not having OSU (or a real PSU) in the mix hurts because that moves everybody up a notch. It is looking like a one-BCS bid league ... unless, say, Michigan and Michigan State each end up around 10-2.

That's actually a good thing (other than the lost revenue) because it won't move an undeserving, underwhelming team into one of those Jan. 1 games against what will be dynamite SEC opposition (take your pick from UGa, South Carolina, Florida, etc.).

Agreed on even the Insight Bowl (or whatever it's called now) ... Big 12 will send a good team there too.

MSU has to hope that Maxwell comes along. I think he will be fine in the long run.

Somebody somewhere will win a bowl game. But they could be underdogs in nearly every match-up.

Meyer talked about that this week. He said they have good corners and bringing blitz pressure puts them more on an island.

This is a case where one domino knocks down the next domino. Nate Williams has been slowed and Mike Bennett has been out. So the D-line has not been as effective as they need them to be, so they've had to bring blitzes. The blitzes worked well against Cal, so my guess is we will see more of them. (My guess is with superior talent they will be very vanilla against UAB and then try and unleash hell on Maxwell and Martinez the next 2 weeks.)

It all has to fit together and make sense. You don't just play bump-and-run to be macho. It has to fit into the overall scheme. I think Fickell favors what has worked for them for years, playing it safe, giving up stuff underneath and stopping them in the red zone.

Who do you think will be the best Heisman candidate from the conference at the end of the year?

Now that we have 3 games under our belt, one quarter of the season being over, what w/l record do you predict for the Buckeyes?