Who Joins The Big Ten?

The Big Ten conference has made no secret about the fact that they want a 12th school in the conference. It gives them a chance to have a championship game in football (read: $$$). Who makes sense? I know there are academic standards and I don't know who falls into that category, so I'll only look at things from a geographic and athletic standpoint.

Northern Illinois makes sense geographically, but I don't know if the school is big enough to work into the Big Ten.

Pittsburgh seems to make the most sense to me. Penn St has always been at the outer edges in terms of geography. They're pretty good in football and basketball, so they would assist the conference from that standpoint. They have a huge rivalry with West Virginia, so I don't know if they want to split that up.

Missouri has been tossed around as a possibility. I can't see the Mizzou/Kansas rivalry being broken up -> that's one of the biggest around considering both football and basketball together. It's all-right geographically, though.

Nebraska has been tossed around as well. That's too far geographically in my opinion - Penn St to Nebraska is a long way. Same with Rutgers, which has also been mentioned.

I haven't heard anyone talk about Iowa State, though. They traditionally haven't been very strong in either major sport, which might bring down the Big Ten standings overall.

Besides Northern Illinois, there are couple other MAC schools the might work - Akron, Kent, Central/Western/Eastern Michigan, and so on. But they all might be too small to fit into the Big Ten.

Finally, Cincinnati and Louisville might work geographically. They have both had decent years lately in football and have a history in basketball.

My choice would be Pittsburgh, though. It could also open the door for "travel buddy" basketball schedules like they have in the Pac-10 to cut down on travel. Penn St and Pitt would be grouped together, as would Minnesota and Iowa. Other schools would have their travel partner.

The way the Pac-10 does it, Arizona and Arizona St (partners) travel on Thursday to Washington and Washington St. Then, on Saturday, they flip-flop (Arizona plays Washington St and Arizona St plays Washington). That really cuts back on the travel - instead of Arizona going to Washington, returning, then going to Washington St some other time.

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