The Big Ten Conference will release a revised 2022 football schedule after this season, per a report by the Detroit Free Press.
What’s the reason for the change? It all goes back to the changes that were made to the 2020 Big Ten football schedule due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The revised slate that season included each team playing eight conference games and then a “Champions Week” game on the same date as the Big Ten Championship.
As a result of that format, several cross-division games were removed from the schedule while six other games had their locations changed. Below are those six matchups, which resulted in the schools playing in the same location in 2020 as they did in 2019:
- Michigan at Indiana
- Indiana at Michigan State
- Michigan State at Michigan
- Nebraska at Purdue
- Wisconsin at Nebraska
- Purdue at Wisconsin
For the 2021 season, the sites of the six games listed above were swapped to accommodate the changes made during 2020. The matchups in 2021 looked like this (below) and were scheduled to be the same in 2022:
- Indiana at Michigan
- Michigan State at Indiana
- Michigan at Michigan State
- Purdue at Nebraska
- Nebraska at Wisconsin
- Wisconsin at Purdue
According to the report from the Detroit Free Press, the Michigan State Spartans will now play at Michigan and host Indiana in 2022. Additionally, the Michigan Wolverines will now travel to take on Indiana next season.
While they didn’t report on the matchups involving Nebraska, Purdue, and Wisconsin in 2022, those games will likely swap locations also. That would mean Purdue will host Nebraska, Nebraska will host Wisconsin, and Wisconsin will host Purdue.
The Big Ten previously announced their future football schedules through the 2025 season. Schedules from 2023 through 2025 will have to be revised also, but it’s not known if they will be released in conjunction with the new 2022 slate.
A somewhat trivial need to shift game sites, compared to what the SEC, XII, American, and others are having to do incoming years! :). The question is does the B1G stay at 9 conference games long term, etc.
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Of course, there’s always craziness that can happen still… Maybe the B1G decides inviting Kansas and Missouri isn’t so bad after all…