FanHouse Big Ten Football

Yeah, I know what you're thinking, smart guy. You're thinking this post should be one letter long, and that letter should be 'F.' It's true that the Big Ten did little to advance its reputation during the season, and even less during the postseason. In spite of it all, there are still a few diamonds among the, um, whatever else it is the diamonds are scattered among.

They're scattered among things like 35-3, a 1-6 bowl game record, the fall of the Michigan dynasty, a tragically unwarranted and completely unjustified preseason overrating, several regressions to the mean, and the worst sendoff since the last episode of "Seinfeld."

So we'll go through the league team by team, painful as that is, to build up the successes and try to understand the failures of Big Ten football in 2008. Yes, I used "success" and "Big Ten football" in the same sentence without the connecting phrase "lack of." Deal with it, Buck. Every team gets an overall grade and a quick look at its prognosis for the 2009 season. For you Big Ten fans, I promise you it's not all bad news; for you Big Ten haters, I promise you it's not all good.

If you follow the coaching carousel at all, you already know the name Mike Locksley. He's been on everybody's "coordinators to watch" list for a couple seasons now, and he's been connected with almost as many jobs as Lane Kiffin and Will Muschamp.

Well, Ron Zook's offensive coordinator is headed to the Southwest. Monday, the University of New Mexico named him as their new head football coach. Locksley was due for a head coaching gig. While Illinois football this year had all the consistency of failed custard, the Illini offense got the job done. Locksley is also known as a top-notch recruiter, which had to please Paul Krebs, the Lobos' sheriff.

Locksley's hiring increases the number of African American head coaches in the Football Bowl Subdivision from three to four. To put that in perspective, before yesterday one-fortieth of FBS programs had an African American head coach; now, one-thirtieth of them do. That's progress, but it's still a drop from the start of this past season, when we were all the way up to one-twentieth.

Time will tell how this move works out for the Lobos, but Locksley has a solid resume. The real question, however, is "What does this mean for Illinois?"