B1G Power Rankings, Week 10

[TyphonInc]

I didn't want to vote this week because I'm still very concerned with how bad I see OSU performing. Next week will help me sort out the log jam in the West. I try not to move teams more than 3 spots in a week, but I had to in order to make it, make sense to me.

Good

1. Michigan (--) - Unanimous #1

Not Good

2. Michigan State (+3) - Best Run D in the nation.

3. Ohio State (+4) - At least it was a W? And everyone else showed warts too.

4. Penn State (-2) - That ... was UGLY

5. Iowa (-2) - last second loss to an enigmatic Purdue.

6. Wisconsin (-2) - Rutgers...

7. Purdue (+2) - moving up.

8. Northwestern (--) - In the driver's seat to win the West

Bad

9. Maryland (-3) - 26 yards rushing?!? That's OSU type bad there.

10. Nebraska (--) - Had a lot of Fight in the Shoe

12. Indiana (+1) - Rest up

13. Illinois (+1) - Best Beard in the Big Ten

11. Minnesota (-2) - yuck

14. Rutgers (--) - Guess what, they still suck.

[medinabuckeye1]

I added in @TyphonInc 's vote.  No changes.  

[medinabuckeye1]

3. Ohio State (+4) - At least it was a W? And everyone else showed warts too.

A while back you wanted to drop Ohio State a bunch and I think it was @Brutus Buckeye that pointed out that even if Ohio State isn't as good as you had hoped, that doesn't necessarily mean that other teams automatically are.  
Michigan State has an elite run defense.  What else?  Northwestern lost at home to Akron.  Purdue lost at home to EMU.  Penn State has three losses including at home to Ohio State.  Wisconsin has three losses.  Iowa has three losses.  
Ohio State is obviously NOT what I hoped they would be this year but, other than Michigan, I don't see any teams in this league that I think would beat them on a neutral field tomorrow.  That could obviously change depending on how things go in East Lansing on Saturday.  
IMHO, the conference as a whole is down this year.  Michigan being better than expected helps but of the four teams that were ranked ahead of them in the preseason (tOSU, UW, PSU, MSU) not one looks anywhere close to elite.  I would say that PU and M are the only two teams performing at a higher level than I expected.  

[Anonymous Coward]

Maaaaaaybe Northwestern is playing about its preseason grade.

But that depends on the way we judge them -- whether we are holding them to eye test or conference resume. Because if it's eye test, you're right, and they're basically exactly who we thought they were. In fact, by eye test, they could win the West and still be LESS than what ELA was predicting (Top 25, if I recall).

But by conference resume, there's no way they aren't outpacing all expectations, perhaps as much as Michigan and Purdue.

[ELA]

I had Northwestern and Iowa both right around #20 preseason, higher than I saw them anywhere else.

[medinabuckeye1]

Maaaaaaybe Northwestern is playing about its preseason grade.

But that depends on the way we judge them -- whether we are holding them to eye test or conference resume. Because if it's eye test, you're right, and they're basically exactly who we thought they were. In fact, by eye test, they could win the West and still be LESS than what ELA was predicting (Top 25, if I recall).

But by conference resume, there's no way they aren't outpacing all expectations, perhaps as much as Michigan and Purdue.

I think it is two things.  You talked a little bit about both but I want to expand on it a bit.  
First, looking at just the conference record, NU is EASILY #2 behind Michigan.  Now when you include "eye test" but still only look at conference games it gets mushy.  The road win at Purdue, and the double-digit wins over MSU and UW are great and the three point loss to unanimous #1 Michigan is fine.  The other two conference games are not good.  They needed OT to beat UNL which looked horrible then but may be acceptable now that Nebraska looks a bit better but the squeaker over unanimous #14 Rutgers is ugly no matter how you look at it.  
Second is the OOC slate.  Losing by 10 to a likely CFP bound Notre Dame isn't a problem but losing by two TD's at home to a Dook team that is below .500 in a weak ACC is bad and losing at home to an Akron team that is below .500 in the MAC is beyond ugly.  
The Wildcats are an enigma.  When a team has one result that is just out-of-character good or bad I generally view that result as just a fluke and basically ignore it.  With Northwestern it isn't one, it is three great games, three terrible games, and three in the middle:

• Three great games:  14 point win over UW, 10 point win in East Lansing, 3 point loss to Michigan:  Based on those three alone I would rank Northwestern #2 and I think it would be unanimous.  
• Three middle games:  4 point win in West Lafayette, OT win over Nebraska, 10 point loss to Notre Dame:  Based on those three alone I would rank Northwestern somewhere in the #2-#4 group.  
• Three terrible games:  14 point home loss to Dook, 5 point home loss to Akron, 3 point road win over Rutgers:  Based on those three alone I would rank Northwestern #13.  

[Anonymous Coward]

NU has been like this for decades. In the Carr era, I used to frequently update OOC winning percentages for the conference, and only Michigan and NU had better win% in the Big Ten than OOC. For Michigan, that was mostly about big non-con games and, since Carr won the Big Ten 5 times and was almost always in the race, ya know, we were just cool with it. But Northwestern had none of these excuses. Which made it a fascinating outlier.

Wanna know my best guess explanation? Honestly, I think a team like Northwestern doesn't care about ANYTHING in the OOC except experimenting to -- later on -- maximize its odds to be the best it can in the Big Ten. And, if true, that's something that Fitzgerald could have easily learned, for example, from Randy Walker.

The biggest flaw in this guess: That this is an incredible risk to their bowl eligibility; so, why do it? Obviouslt that means it needs to be further developed. But I still speculate that it's partway there.

[ELA]

NU has been like this for decades. In the Carr era, I used to frequently update OOC winning percentages for the conference, and only Michigan and NU had better win% in the Big Ten than OOC. For Michigan, that was mostly about big non-con games and, since Carr won the Big Ten 5 times and was almost always in the race, ya know, we were just cool with it. But Northwestern had none of these excuses. Which made it a fascinating outlier.

Wanna know my best guess explanation? Honestly, I think a team like Northwestern doesn't care about ANYTHING in the OOC except experimenting to -- later on -- maximize its odds to be the best it can in the Big Ten. And, if true, that's something that Fitzgerald could have easily learned, for example, from Randy Walker.

The biggest flaw in this guess: That this is an incredible risk to their bowl eligibility; so, why do it? Obviouslt that means it needs to be further developed. But I still speculate that it's partway there.

The weirder part this year is that Northwestern opened with a conference win (in a decently challenging road trip to Purdue) before going 0-3.  So it's not like you can say it took them a minute to get going in this case.

[TyphonInc]

You can if you also say it took Purdue a moment as well to get it going.

[Anonymous Coward]

The weirder part this year is that Northwestern opened with a conference win (in a decently challenging road trip to Purdue) before going 0-3.  So it's not like you can say it took them a minute to get going in this case.

True, but Purdue wasn't fully weaponized by then, and that game was UGLY. 
Also: I don't think it's necessarily counter to this idea for Northwestern to care a LOT about a week 1 conference opponent and then spend the nonconference weeks prepping more for the Big Ten teams to come than the non-cons in their face those weeks.

[betarhoalphadelta]

The weirder part this year is that Northwestern opened with a conference win (in a decently challenging road trip to Purdue) before going 0-3.  So it's not like you can say it took them a minute to get going in this case.

Purdue statistically was stronger in that game in a lot of ways with two exceptions: costly turnovers and costly penalties. 
Purdue was 0-3 in turnover margin. All three of those Purdue interceptions were followed by NU touchdowns. I can't exactly call them points "off" turnovers as Northwestern drove 55 and 64 yards for two of those scores, but that means they were drives where Purdue was at least in good field position. But that's 3 interceptions, and 21 points for NU.
Penalty-wise, although Purdue had 9-95 and NU had 6-56, the key was one late [unnecessary] personal foul. Purdue had stopped NU on 3rd down, with the ability to get the ball back, down 4. But that extended the drive and NU could run out the clock from there. 
Purdue outgained NU, Purdue was better on 3rd down, Purdue had a higher completion percentage, and rushed for 8.1 ypc and over 200 yards. It's not like Northwestern came out and just dominated the game. It's one of those games that Purdue could--and some would say should--have won. Or at the very least had the ball to have a shot at the end. But they shot themselves in the foot one too many times. 

[Anonymous Coward]

It wasn't until at least Mizzou at the very earliest where I began to see a light for Purdue that I had expected in the preseason but was missing.
Rondale was great right away, but that's not the same thing.

[betarhoalphadelta]

It wasn't until at least Mizzou at the very earliest where I began to see a light for Purdue that I had expected in the preseason but was missing.
Rondale was great right away, but that's not the same thing.

That's certainly true. We were still playing musical QB against Northwestern, and the EMU game was so incredibly sloppy due to weather that we weren't running our normal gameplan anyway. Brohm has since said that he was disappointed in the way he called the EMU game and described it as "playing not to lose". 
But even then, the difference between the first half against NU and the second half was stark. It looked like a completely different Purdue team. As you state, the offense hadn't been "fully weaponized" yet, but the defense was stout. Not sure if you remember, but Purdue shut out NU in the second half, but only was able to muster 10 points when they needed 14. 
I'm just saying that you can't put everything on Purdue not looking like the team they became without realizing that Northwestern did NOT look particularly good in that game either. It took them several games to get going, Purdue just made more critical mistakes than Northwestern did and that was the difference in that game.