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Urban Meyer critical of B1G’s 6-game requirement for championship game

Scott Schultz

By Scott Schultz

Published:

Wisconsin is unbeaten, so far.

While the Badgers are one of the nation’s top teams, they may not be eligible to appear in the Big Ten Championship Game if they are forced to miss one more scheduled game, due to conference rules.

Scheduled games with Nebraska and Purdue were cancelled earlier this season due to COVID-19 issues.

Before Wisconsin’s game with Northwestern this Saturday, former Ohio State head coach, and Fox Sports analyst Urban Meyer said that the league should revisit the rules to ensure the Badgers have an equal opportunity to compete for the title should they finish without a loss.

“Wisconsin over the last 20 years, I’d put them as a Top 10 program, maybe not in wins but you’re talking about consistency and identity,” Meyer said. “So the Big Ten made some bold statements early in the year saying we’re not going to revisit this and this is the way it is. That’s wrong. You’re going to have to revisit it.

“If Wisconsin’s one of the best teams and I think they are, if they play maybe five games, (they can’t) play a mid-week game. You can’t do that to a player. Their shelf life is done. Find a way. Bend your knees. Bend your ankles. Be flexible and change the rules. Adapt. That would not be right to keep Wisconsin out of the Big Ten Championship.”

The Big Ten’s current rules for tiebreakers is as follows:

“The records of the two tied teams will be compared based on the best cumulative conference winning percentage of non-divisional opponents: (a) Example: East 1 non-divisional opponents are 20-7, East 2 non-divisional opponents are 19-8 – East 1 would be the representative. (b) In the event of an unbalanced schedule, the records of the two tied teams will be compared based on the best cumulative conference winning percentage of non-divisional opponents, regardless of how many non divisional opponents each team played. If one or both teams played no non-divisional opponents, move to next step in tiebreaker.”

 

Scott Schultz

Scott Schultz covers Michigan State Football, along with Breaking News for B1G Football & Basketball for Saturday Tradition. He also serves as an Automotive News Editor & Writer, and Softball Writer elsewhere on the web. Follow him on Twitter @SRSchultz.