Clearly the accomplished, award-winning sports handicapper Marc Lawrence doesn’t think so. And his deep dive into scheduling unearthed an interesting factoid relative to the Big Ten schedule for 2019.
Twelve Big Ten teams will meet at minimum one non-conference rival that went bowling in 2018, meaning that given a league schedule of 42 games vs. out of conference rivals, exactly half will come against teams that ending their season in a bowl game.
Indeed, Purdue and Michigan will each meet bowlers in all of their non-conference opponents this season while Michigan State, Penn State and Maryland will each play two outside-conference bowl opponents from 2018. Now the kicker, no pun intended:
Counting conference and non-conference contests, every Big Ten team will face no fewer than six bowl teams from the 2018 season; Wisconsin, Purdue, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan and Penn State are booked for eight such matchups.
