Andy Katz from ESPN.com reports that the Big Ten divisions will be:
| Division A |
Division B |
| Iowa |
Illinois |
| Michigan |
Indiana |
| Michigan State |
Ohio State |
| Minnesota |
Penn State |
| Nebraska |
Purdue |
| Northwestern |
Wisconsin |
Yesterday I posted several Solver Foundation models that attempted to find a realignment that is “as fair as possible”. If you take a characterization of a program’s historical strength to be its Sagarin rating over the past twelve years, and you are looking to build two evenly matched divisions then this is an extremely fair proposal. The average Sagarin rating is almost identical:
| Division A |
|
Division B |
|
| Iowa |
77.46 |
Illinois |
69.56 |
| Michigan |
82.98 |
Indiana |
65.55 |
| Michigan State |
75.82 |
Ohio State |
87.67 |
| Minnesota |
73.96 |
Penn State |
82.03 |
| Nebraska |
83.65 |
Purdue |
77.25 |
| Northwestern |
69.61 |
Wisconsin |
81.59 |
| Average A |
77.25 |
Average B |
77.27 |
In fact, this is the fairest possible realignment that follows these rules:
- Six teams per division.
- Preserve the Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana in-state rivalries. (But not Illinois.)
- “Fairness” is measured by Sagarin rating.
No artificial rules about splitting Michigan and Ohio State are required – that happens naturally as a result of trying to find a fair split. Division A has 427 total conference wins since ‘93, Division B has 412. Division A has 724 total wins versus Division B’s 708. Note however that Nebraska is in Division A and that it had a run of near perfection in the early 90’s. The average attendance for Division A schools is 69,128 versus 74,035 in Division B; much of the difference is due to Northwestern.
Download this spreadsheet to see more details, or to create your own realignments. Follow my instructions from yesterday if you wish to use Solver Foundation to experiment with the models.
