Leaders and Legends: TCU's Last Laugh and Exposing the Big Ten

Billboards stand in Columbus congratulating TCU on a Rose Bowl victory, signed by the “little sisters of the poor.”

I’m sure most already are aware of the situation and story that goes along with these billboards, but for those who don’t, I’ll make a long story short.

Ohio State president E. Gorden Gee reportedly said, "I do know, having been both a Southeastern Conference president and a Big Ten president, that it's like murderer's row every week for these schools." Regarding the strength of non-automatic qualifiers like TCU and Boise State, he went on to say that Ohio State does not “play the Little Sisters of the Poor. We play very fine schools on any given day.”

This last laugh display by TCU not only shows that the Horned Frogs are a BCS-quality school, but also it shows the weakness of the Big 10 conference overall.

TCU will be one of only two schools this year to boast a undefeated record, a feat that hardly happens to anyone besides the national champion.

However TCU did not have a chance to play for a national title and instead competed against Big Ten foe Wisconsin, a so-called powerhouse football team scoring an average of 41 points per game, in the Rose Bowl.

The Frogs held Wisconsin to only 19 points, and scored 21 of their own despite being out-gained, out-rushed and out-clocked.

It raises the question, is the Big Ten a powerhouse conference, or college football’s biggest group of pretenders?

Ohio State’s Gee claims the school plays “fine schools” and certainly has the schedule to back it up with wins against Marshall (5-7), Ohio (8-5, blowout bowl loss.) and future national champions Eastern Michigan (2-10).

It seems the entire Big Ten plays “fine schools” like, Austin Peay, Illinois State, Eastern Illinois, UMass and Towson.

The claim can be made that the Big Ten operates as follows: play a weak out-of-conference schedule, gain half of bowl eligible wins out of conference, win three or four in conference games to become bowl eligible, go to bowl game.

It is in these bowl games that the Big Ten's pretender claim can be made.

These bowl games are the test of strength of college football conferences, and the Big Ten showed that they were far from strong.

The Big Ten went 3-5 this year in bowl games with a average margin of defeat at 20.4 points and average margin of victory at 10.6 points.

The biggest Big Ten win this bowl season was Ohio State’s victory over SEC opponent Arkansas.

Arkansas, the dark horse of the SEC, narrowly made it into a BCS bowl with a win over LSU during the last game of the regular season.

Arkansas nearly took the victory from Ohio State late in the fourth, but an interception ended all hopes.

The Big Ten’s worst defeat was suffered by co-Big Ten Champ Michigan State in a one-sided 49-7 affair which their opponent Alabama proved that perhaps a BCS bowl would have been a better destination for the Tide.

So what would the outcome of a Ohio State-Alabama BCS game be this year?

The Big Ten seems to improve with the addition of former college football powerhouse Nebraska, and the creation of a upstart conference championship game.

But only time will tell whether the divisions should be called the Leaders and the Legends, or the Pretenders and the Once-Weres.