Another New Year's (OK, this year it was Jan. 2), another bad Big Ten day

Legends? Not really. Leaders? I think not.

Michigan State saved the Big Ten from a second-straight New Year's (OK, Jan. 2) goose egg on Monday, using three overtimes to defeat Georgia. Keep in mind Michigan State was (in my opinion) the second-best team in the Big Ten, while Georgia was (in my opinion) the fourth- or maybe even fifth-best SEC team.

But the Spartans showed they were a team with heart before getting to Tampa, and showed it again in rallying from a 16-0 hole to force overtime and hanging on dearly until they finally won the game.

Wisconsin lost to a first-rate Oregon team in a terrific Rose Bowl. The odds of the Badgers tying the game with a 25-yard, last-second play and an extra-point kick were slim, but I'd have loved to see Wisconsin have gone downfield instead of burning off the last two seconds spiking the ball in an ill-advised attempt to stop the clock long enough to have more time to set up its touchdown try. Bret Bielema's Rose Bowl clock-management over the last 366 days ... not great.

Hey, Oregon had 621 yards. It was a better team than the Badgers (which gained 508), albeit not by much. I thought Wisconsin was lucky just to get to the Rose Bowl after somehow sneaking past Michigan State in the Big Ten title game. The Badgers simply didn't have a defense good enough to play at the highest level. But two straight Big Ten titles are nothing to dismiss.

Ohio State's Gator Bowl loss to Florida? I wasn't interested enough to watch.

Nebraska's 30-13 Capital One Bowl defeat to South Carolina? Yeccch. Tom Shatel of the Omaha World-Herald wrote this pointed post-mortem on the Huskers' season.

And that sorry Penn State showing against Houston in the TicketCity Bowl? I'd say the Insight and Meineke Car Care bowls did the right thing kicking the Nittany Lions down the Big Ten's bowl ladder.

Michigan gets Virginia Tech tonight in the Sugar Bowl. The Wolverines play a team that isn't as good as Oregon, obviously, and may not be as good as South Carolina, Georgia or Houston. But even a Wolverines win only makes the Big Ten 4-6 in bowls, and two of the wins came from Purdue and Illinois in two of the crummiest bowls in captivity, the Kraft Fight Hunger and the Little Caesars Pizza.

Unlike last year against Alabama in the Cap One, Michigan State represented today. The Dantonio abides. Bielema and Bo Pelini? Not so much.

CONFERENCE BOWL STANDINGS SO FAR:

Big 12   6-1

Mid-American   3-1

Conference USA   3-1

SEC   4-2

Big East   2-1

Sun Belt   1-1

Independents   1-1

Mountain West  2-3

ACC   2-4

Big Ten   3-6

Pac-12   2-5

WAC   0-3

That's right. The Big Ten and Pac-12 are a combined 5-11, 4-10 if you throw out Illinois' win over UCLA in San Francisco.

No wonder they want to pit their teams against each other every September as soon as possible (which is 2017). Someone will get to win.