One half of this year’s Big Ten Championship Game is set.
The Big Ten announced Tuesday that Oregon had officially clinched one spot in the Big Ten Championship Game following “a comprehensive evaluation of all possible scenarios over the final two weeks of regular-season play” that determined Oregon would earn a championship game berth in any possible tiebreaking scenario even if it loses its regular-season finale against Washington.
Well see you in Indianapolis, @oregonfootball
— Big Ten Football (@B1Gfootball) November 19, 2024
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That leaves one spot up for grabs in what will effectively serve as a Big Ten championship play-in game this weekend when Ohio State hosts Indiana at Ohio Stadium.
If the winner of Saturday’s game between the Buckeyes and Hoosiers also wins its regular-season finale next week, there won‘t be any need for complicated math.
Ohio State will make the Big Ten Championship Game with an 11-1 record if it beats Indiana and Michigan as it would hold a head-to-head tiebreaker over Indiana and Penn State, the other two teams in the conference that could finish with one loss.
Indiana will make the Big Ten Championship Game if it beats Ohio State and Purdue as it would be one of a maximum of two Big Ten teams (along with Oregon, who is 11-0 with just one more regular-season game to play) who could finish the season undefeated.
Penn State can only make the Big Ten Championship Game if Ohio State beats Indiana but loses to Michigan, and the Nittany Lions would still need help in that scenario. If Indiana and Penn State finish as the Big Ten’s only two one-loss teams, the second berth in the championship game will be determined by a comparison of the cumulative conference winning percentage of their conference opponents.
The full list of potential tiebreaker scenarios can be found on the Big Ten’s official website, but Ohio State has no reason to worry about those scenarios right now. If Ohio State wins each of its next two games, it is guaranteed to earn a spot in the Big Ten Championship Game and a rematch with Oregon, the team that’s handed the Buckeyes their only loss this season. If Ohio State loses to Indiana, it will be officially eliminated from the Big Ten Championship Game race as both the Ducks and Hoosiers would finish with no more than one loss.
If Ohio State beats Indiana but loses to Michigan, the only scenario in which the Buckeyes would still make the Big Ten Championship Game would be if Indiana loses to Purdue and Penn State loses to either Minnesota or Maryland. If all three teams finished with two losses, Ohio State would earn the second berth in the Big Ten title game because of the head-to-head wins it would have over the Hoosiers and Nittany Lions.
