When you're as big as the Big Ten is today, you need to make adjustments. So that's exactly what the conference did in determining new tiebreaker rules for the championship game.
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For the record, the Big Ten now consists of a whopping 18 teams. And just when you thought college football couldn't get any crazier.
On top of all that, the conference has done away with divisions. So that could complicate things when it comes to the title game,
"In previous years, the winners of the Big Ten East and West divisions met in the Big Ten Championship Game," wrote Shehan Jeyarajah of CBS Sports. "The divisional races were guaranteed to have a head-to-head matchup, meaning that there was no need for tiebreakers unless three or more teams were tied. However, only two teams will emerge from 18 to head to the Big Ten title game. Conceivably, a large number of teams could be tied for the top two spots and have never played each other."
So, yeah, things will be a little different.
As Jeyarajah noted, the tiebreaker will now be determined as follows:
- Head-to-head results during the regular season
- Record against all common conference opponents
- Record against mutual conference opponents with best record
- Best Big Ten winning percentage of conference opponents
- Highest ranking by SportSource Analytics after the regular season
- Random draw of tied teams
This is all similar to what the remade SEC decided, though No. 5 in the SEC features a point-differential tiebreaker. Whatever, if you get to No. 5, you truly are just winging it.
Sort of like a conference with 18 teams calling itself the Big Ten.
