What's gone wrong with the Big Ten?

Indiana and Minnesota ahead of Ohio State and Purdue?

The Big Ten race is more muddled than ever. Usually, this time of the year, Michigan, Ohio State and Penn State begin to emerge to the forefront of the conference, waiting for the last two weeks of the season when Michigan faces the other bigwigs. Now, with this newfangled Big Ten that has half the conference running the spread offense and Minnesota - Minnesota! - playing competitively, the Spartans are one of the two remaining undefeated teams, along with JoePa's Nittany Lions.

And after that, it's a mess. Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, the Buckeyes and the Golden Gophers all have just one conference loss, and, with the exception of Indiana, all are playing well enough to make a run for Pasadena.

Josh Kleinbaum Apocalypse Now

This weekend, while the Wolverines sit at home licking their wounds from an embarrassing loss to Sparty in which they were thoroughly outplayed, look for the contenders to separate from the pretenders.

Penn State will face one of its stiffest tests of the season in Ohio State, but has the luxury of playing in State College.

Purdue's Drew Brees will try to show that he is still, in fact, the best quarterback in the conference, as Michigan State's Bill Burke tries to show that his eye-popping performance against Michigan wasn't a fluke.

Indiana and Wisconsin are both still darkhorses in the conference race, but after Saturday, one will be out of it.

And Iowa and Northwestern play the Pointless Game of the Week, a battle for sole possession of the Big Ten basement, which means it'll probably be a CBS national telecast.

Ogunleye gone: Now in his third year as Indiana's head coach, Cam Cameron has been trying to prove that his school is not just a hoops school.

After a 34-17 victory over Northwestern on Saturday - a game Indiana once trailed by two touchdowns - the Hoosiers appeared to be on the right track.

The win improved their record to 2-1 in the Big Ten and they looked to be a potential sleeper in the conference race.

Which is why, when Adewale Ogunleye went down with an injury on Saturday, it was more than his knee that hurt - all of Bloomington was in pain.

The star defensive end has been a force for the Hoosiers all season. In six games, he has 22 tackles, 11 of them for loss including eight sacks. The hard-hitter has forced two funbles.

The tackles-for-loss, sacks and forced fumbles all lead the team.

"No question, he was having an all-Big Ten season, an All-America season," Cameron said. "We're going to miss him, but he'll continue to captain this football team."

- Josh Kleinbaum can be reached via e-mail at jkbaum@umich.edu

Kleinbaum

Apocalypse Now

10-13-99