The B1G championship doesn't really mean anything beyond having played another good team. Michigan and Penn State ended up with the same record, Michigan's two losses were as close as you can get, but yet somehow Penn State is a better team than Michigan now - I'm fine with it, just pointing out that if Penn State fans think they should be ahead of OSU with a WORSE record and resume, Michigan should be ahead of Penn State with the SAME record and, at worst, equal resume.
- You twist it all to fit your narrative. Being the champion of the best conference in football should mean a lot. Couple that with beating OSU head to head should too. You say conference championships don't mean much but the committee originally said they should be a factor. Urban Meyer himself said that conference champions should be in, years ago. The Big Ten is the best conference in football this year. If any championship should mean something that one should and Michigan would lose to PSU if they played tomorrow IMO. They have not looked as good and PSU has looked much better since they saw each other a few months ago. You ignore that PSU beat MSU and Iowa but a pretty wide margin. The team has improved and that is why early wins never used to mean much with highly ranked teams.
Based on that logic, Ohio State could have lost to Michigan and still been ahead of Penn State, especially since the game was so close. Wins and losses early and late should mean the same thing. And I struggle to add the B1G championship to Penn State's resume in this situation because at the end of the day, all 3 teams beat Wisconsin and all 3 teams played a good non conference schedule.
- You don't look at the quality of the wins/losses late in the season that shows Penn State's improvement, and Michigan's failings. And your right. Ohio State barely lost a step on the rankings after losing to PSU. If they had lost to Michigan they still would have been ranked ahead of PSU because there is no way they get dropped from 2 to 7. But not because they should have been. The difference is Michigan didn't not look like they were as good of a team later in the season.
Since OSU beat Michigan who beat Penn State who beat OSU - you can't just go off head to head to figure out who the "best" team is.
- I am not doing that. Ohio State did not look any better than Penn State later in the season. PSU exposed there Oline and showed what a heavy pass rush could do to that Oline. Other teams followed suit. I am basing it off of the play of the teams. PSU has played better than both Ohio State and Michigan in the second half of the season. Michigan has not played well. Ohio State is pretty even with PSU in later games so the head to head is the tie breaker.
Ohio State had a better record and played a tougher schedule that included Oklahoma and Nebraska
After you clearly define that OSU has the best resume, looking at just Michigan and Penn State, Michigan has the better resume IMO - they played Colorado, beat Penn State head to head and have the same record. They also beat Wisconsin. Those 3 wins are better than Penn State's top 3 wins (OSU, Wisconsin, Temple).
- This is an ongoing problem in college football. Ranking opponents in different conferences against each other. Temple is a very good team. Historically they have been bad so they are considered a bad team. Pitt beat Clemson, so how bad are they really? Ohio State beat Oklahoma but who did Oklahoma really beat to be ranked so high? If a power 5 team has only 2 losses they are always rated in the top twenty. A perennial power like Oklahoma is going to be in the top ten. It is perception based on the past. The strength of schedule should play into it more than it does. Oklahoma lost their two biggest games. Washington didn't have a tough schedule and they lost their to their toughest opponent in USC. And Colorado isn't as good as they were originally thought to be. Who did they beat? They nearly tied Oregon 41-38. Their vaunted offense only scored 10 against and average Stanford team this year.20-10 against a not so good UCLA team. Their best win may have been against an average Utah team. So much of the rankings are based on reputation and beating teams that are usually good, but aren't. That is why I point out the MSU game against Ohio State. They are not a good team this year. The biggest crime in college rankings is that past performance and reputation carry far too much weight and it shouldn't.
As far as struggling with Penn State and Michigan - everyone struggled with Michigan, and playing at Penn State in hindsight was the toughest game on our schedule. I'll grant you that the MSU game was a bad one, as was the game against Northwestern. But then Penn State struggled in some of their wins too, it happens.
- Penn State struggled with Minnesota. That game was a turning point for them. They had trouble with Indiana too because of their ability to score quickly. They have a good QB and had a good head coach. Indiana played Ohio State tough last year. Then the only other struggle was Ohio State. PSU installed an entirely new offense. It took time to come together. After the October 1st Minnesota game, which PSU one in OT on the first play, the team looked completely different. They started to gel with the offense. Their games from that point on were all impressive wins or impressive comebacks. They didn't have any late losses, or games where they didn't look good.
This "old standard" needs to be thrown out. OSU/Michigan/Penn State all beat each other and all beat Wisconsin at some point - the only reason Penn State won the B1G was because Iowa upset Michigan - no team did enough on the field to separate themselves in B1G play - luckily for us we had the best record of the 3 teams and the toughest schedule.
