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The BSD Big Ten Power Rankings, Week 2

Spoiler: Penn State fell a bit.

By Bill DiFilippo
The Wildcats were the biggest movers in this week's rankings.
The Wildcats were the biggest movers in this week's rankings.
Caylor Arnold-USA TODAY Sports

Week One of Big Ten football is, for the most part, in the books. Sure we're still one Ohio State game away from the first week completely being wrapped up, but for the most part, it's time to look forward to week two.

With that, we have some new Big Ten Power Rankings for you. Per usual, Nick, Matt and myself will rank all 14 teams in the conference from best to worst, except now that we know something about most of the teams, we can explain our reasoning. What fun! Here we go:

Bill

  1. Ohio State (Last Week: 1)
  2. Michigan State (2)
  3. Nebraska (4)
  4. Wisconsin (3)
  5. Minnesota (6)
  6. Northwestern (10)
  7. Rutgers (8)
  8. Iowa (9)
  9. Michigan (7)
  10. Penn State (5)
  11. Maryland (11)
  12. Illinois (14)
  13. Indiana (12)
  14. Purdue (13)
Nothing but respect for this week's big riser in Northwestern. The Wildcats hosted a really good Stanford team, punched them in the mouth and absolutely deserved to walk out victorious. Other than that and the massive fall for Penn State – which may just be because, you know, I'm a Penn State fan – not too much changed for me. The most notable other differences are Nebraska establishing itself as the top team out West, and Illinois looked like a competent football team.

Of course, there's a chance that #TEAMCHAOS will show its head a little later today in the form of Va Tech. Probably not, but it's college football, anything is possible.

Nick

  1. Ohio State (1)
  2. Michigan State (2)
  3. Wisconsin (3)
  4. Minnesota (4)
  5. Nebraska (5)
  6. Northwestern (10)
  7. Michigan (7)
  8. Rutgers (9)
  9. Penn State (6)
  10. Iowa (8)
  11. Indiana (11)
  12. Illinois (13)
  13. Maryland (12)
  14. Purdue (14)

Not a ton of shuffling here for me . The big one is sending Penn State down to #9, because I see no reason for them to be anywhere near the top five. Northwestern impressed me with their performance against Stanford, despite the fact that the Cardinal were probably a little overrated going into the game. Wisconsin, Minnesota and Nebraska may have all faltered in their week one performances, but those falterings came against very good teams, and none of those three were blown out. Positives!

Rutgers, Iowa, Illinois and Maryland were all able to blow out their vastly inferior opponents, which is always a nice way to start the season. That fact, combined with my somewhat-optimistic view of Rutgers' chances to make noise this year were enough to slot them above Penn State for now. In fact, if Penn State looks the way they did this week against Buffalo, and any of Iowa, Indiana or Illinois can show up big time again next week, the Lions may fall further for me. Hard not to feel gloomy right now.

Matt

  1. Ohio State (1)
  2. Michigan State (2)
  3. Wisconsin (5)
  4. Minnesota (4)
  5. Northwestern (10)
  6. Iowa (8)
  7. Nebraska (3)
  8. Rutgers (11)
  9. Illinois (14)
  10. Michigan (7)
  11. Maryland (12)
  12. Indiana (9)
  13. Purdue (13)
  14. Penn State (6)

I know what you are all thinking right now. How on earth can you rank Penn State dead last in the Big 10? To put it quite frankly, the Nittany Lions turned in the worst performance in the Big 10 this weekend. Quite honestly, I'm not even sure how close they are to second worst. PSU needs to show me quite a bit next weekend against Buffalo, by which I mean, a competent offensive plan and execution.

As for the rest of the league, I've tried to base this on what I saw while watching an inordinate amount of football this weekend. Yes, Wisconsin and Minnesota lost, but they showed quite a bit. Northwestern gets a ton of credit for knocking off a good Stanford team. Below them, Iowa, Rutgers, and Illinois looked solid against sub par teams (something PSU could not do), while Nebraska was felled by a hail mary late. Maryland and Indiana got wins, but I was not blown away by anything either did. Purdue escapes the basement by at least looking like a football team against Marshall.

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