Head coaches: The roster of head coaches in the Big Ten right now is as impressive as any league in the country.
Ohio State’s Urban Meyer and Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh are the rock stars. Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst and Penn State’s James Franklin were both finalists for numerous national coach of the year awards. Michigan State had an awful 2016, but Mark Dantonio is rightly considered one of the very best coaches around.
Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz and Northwestern’s Pat Fitzgerald are two of the longest-tenured head coaches in college football. Nebraska’s Mike Riley is highly respected throughout the profession. Illinois hired longtime NFL coach Lovie Smith last year, and Purdue and Minnesota made splashes in landing two of the hottest, young, non-Power 5 coaches in Jeff Brohm and P.J. Fleck, respectively, this offseason.
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Financial muscle: It’s a good time to be someone who writes checks at a Big Ten school these days.
The cash spigot that is the Big Ten Network continues to pay huge dividends, especially since Rutgers and Maryland joined the league. In the fiscal year that ended in June 2015, according to USA Today, the Big Ten distributed $32.4 million to member schools that had full shares (Nebraska, Rutgers and Maryland did not). The money is about to go up, up, up.