The two best teams in the country are Oregon And State of Ohio and the Buckeyes’ only loss was to the Ducks at quarterback in October Will Howard was a second too late to slide so his team could attempt a game-winning field goal.
Four of the top five teams in the AP Top 25 are from the Big Ten Penn State is fourth, its only loss coming after Ohio State had a goal-line stand in the closing minutes a few weeks ago that could have sent the game to overtime.
Indiana – the darling of this college football season – remains undefeated and in fifth place ahead of next weekend’s game against the Buckeyes.
It was a glorious season especially for the Big Ten Michigan‘s national championship last year.
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It was also an incredible challenge given the era of expansion for the teams — whether they were the old guard Big Ten programs or the Pac-12 additions — when they had to travel around the country to play games, sometimes in very strange hours.
The breakdown is quite compelling and basically plays out like this: The teams that have to travel outside their traditional conference area have a very difficult time – and often lose – with only a few exceptions.
USC is a disappointing 4-5 with losses at Michigan, op Minnesota and at Marylandjourneys that the Trojans would never have made had the Pac-12 still existed.
The Wolverines’ 27 points against USC tied for the third-most they’ve scored this season, eclipsing that mark by one and three points against, respectively The state of Arkansas And Fresno State.The Terrapins beat USC but still have a losing record.
Despite Penn State’s success this season, the Nittany Lions trailed 20-6 at halftime when they traveled to USC and needed overtime to beat the Trojans. Iowa is coming off a disappointing 20-17 loss UCLA last week, as only Ohio State held the Hawkeyes to fewer points this season.
One loss at the time Illinois went to Oregon and fell flat in a 38-9 loss. This season, the Wolverines have traveled to the Pacific Northwest twice and lost by double digits to the Huskies and the Ducks.
Washington traveled all over the country to play Rutgers and lost 21-18 in a mistake-filled game to the Huskies, who also lost by 14 at Indiana and fell 35-6 at Penn State this weekend. Iowa scored a season’s worth of points in a 40-16 Iowa City blowout in mid-October against the Huskies.
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Rutgers had a very unfavorable situation in late October when it played at USC after the World Series and the game didn’t start until 11:00 PM ET. The Scarlet Knights played for their body clocks into the wee hours and lost 42-20.
There probably would have been some losses regardless of which team traveled where: State of Michigan went to Oregon and lost by 21; Northwest played in Washington and scored five points; Maryland just visited Oregon and lost by 21; Wisconsin went to USC and lost by 17; and humble Purdue has traveled to both Oregon and State of Oregon this season, losing convincingly to both without scoring a point against the Ducks.
Some Big Ten teams have bucked the trend of traveling far to losing.
Early in the season, when no one knew what Indiana would be, the Hoosiers went to UCLA and throttled the Bruins 42-13. Oregon has gone to Michigan State, Purdue and Michigan and won all of those games convincingly.
Minnesota went to UCLA and won. UCLA went to Penn State and lost, but traveled across the country again for an early start at Rutgers and won and then went to Nebraska the following weekend, beating the Huskers in Lincoln 27-20.
Nebraska visits USC this weekend. The Trojans are 8.5-point favorites and if trends hold, they should beat the Huskers by more than that.
The best example of the newfound Big Ten travel curse came on the night of Oct. 12 in Eugene, when Howard slid a second too late before Ohio State could call a timeout and set up for a potential game-winning field goal.
The Buckeyes didn’t rush back to Ohio State after a short flight from Penn State or Michigan. The entire Ohio State team had to spend more than four hours on a plane to get home from Eugene.
A literal second was the potential difference in the Ohio State-Oregon outcome after all those hours of travel to and from the Pacific Northwest.
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