With Michigan's overtime victory in the Sugar Bowl, the Big Ten finished the bowl season with a 4-6 record. It was Michigan's first BCS game victory since winning the 2000 Orange Bowl (The Wolverines had lost three Rose Bowls in between BCS victories) and the Big Ten picked up their fourth BCS game victory in three years. That total will match the SEC's BCS win total, although the southern conference has the BCS championship wins to put them over the top.
Here is a run down for the Big Ten's bowl performance this bowl season.
Best Win: Michigan State, Outback Bowl
While both schools from Michigan won overtime games against conference runner-ups, we'll give a slight nod to the Spartans, who put together a clutch drive to score a game-tying touchdown and blocked a field goal attempt to lock-up a victory against an SEC team.
Michigan State trailed Georgia 16-0 at the half, and dreadful memories from last year's loss to Alabama were fresh in the memory banks of anyone watching, but 27 second-half points put Georgia on the ropes, and a pair of Dan Conroy field goals gave the Spartans their first bowl victory since winning the 2001 Silicon Valley Bowl.
Honorable Mention: Michigan, Sugar Bowl
The Wolverines had just 184 yards of total offense but took advantage of Virginia Tech mistakes in an overtime victory in New Orleans.
Worst Loss: Penn State, TicketCity Bowl
Penn State's season, perhaps appropriately enough, ended on a down note, as Houston quarterback Case Keenum ripped the Nittany Lions defense to shreds from start to finish. After allowing 162 passing yards per game this season, Penn State gave up 532 passing yards to Keenum, who also threw three touchdowns in the game. Houston had 600 yards of offense, nearly double the yardage allowed on a weekly basis by Penn State during the regular season.
Dishonorable Mention: Iowa, Insight Bowl
Oklahoma jumped out to a 21-0 lead heading in to the fourth quarter and put the Hawkeyes away, after a brief rally.
The Biggest Game: Wisconsin, Rose Bowl (L)
When you are talking about the Big Ten, you are talking about the Rose Bowl. Wisconsin became the fourth Big Ten team to lose consecutive Rose Bowls, joining 2003-2004 Michigan, 1975-77 Michigan, and 1974-75 Ohio State. To be fair, Wisconsin and Oregon were pretty even in the game, playing in the highest scoring first half in Rose Bowl history and going down to the wire, but the Badgers were scoreless in the fourth quarter and a questionable decision to try and spike the football with two seconds left on a running game clock ended up taking away a chance for a final play.
Results
Rose Bowl: Oregon 45, Wisconsin 38
Sugar Bowl: Michigan 23, Virginia Tech 20
Capital One Bowl: South Carolina 30, Nebraska 13
Outback Bowl: Michigan State 33, Georgia 30
Gator Bowl: Florida 24, Ohio State 17
Insight Bowl: Oklahoma 31, Iowa 14
Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas: Texas A&M 33, Northwestern 22
Little Caesars Bowl: Purdue 37, Western Michigan 32
TicketCity Bowl: Houston 30, Penn State 14
Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl: Illinois 20, UCLA 14
Conference-By-Conference Breakdown
- 1-0 vs. ACC
- 0-2 vs. Big 12
- 0-1 vs. Conference USA
- 1-0 vs. MAC
- 1-1 vs. Pac 12
- 1-2 vs. SEC
Overall Grade: C-
The Big Ten went one-for-two in the big BCS games, including one in which they probably should not have had a participant in the first place. A pair of overtime victories is nice but the Big Ten went 0-2 against the Big 12 and 1-2 against the SEC. The Big Ten gets a passing grade but we're not going to get too excited about wins against the MAC, a Pac 12 team with a 6-8 record and a win against an ACC team that was noticeably overrated and played a sloppy game.
Kevin McGuire is a national college football writer for Examiner.com and the host of the No 2-Minute Warning podcast. He can be reached at cfbexaminer@gmail.com.
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