Big Ten trying to gauge reaction to Michigan and Ohio State in separate divisions

DETROIT - The first tactic in any strategy advocating sweeping change is the floating of the trial balloon.

Send it up. Capture everyone's attention. See how many try to shoot it down - and how quickly. The greater the volume of the venom over what's proposed, the more palatable a different end result becomes. It looks more like a rational compromise.

That's certainly part of the Big Ten's

tack in publicly testing the idea of Michigan and Ohio State playing in separate divisions in the new 12-team configuration next year.

Michigan athletic director Dave Brandon reiterated his desire for Michigan and Ohio State in separate divisions while addressing the Detroit Economic Club in Ann Arbor on Wednesday.

Big Ten

commissioner Jim Delany and Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith reaffirmed in interviews the past week that the conference was deliberating all possible divisional templates, including one that would put the Wolverines and Buckeyes on opposite tracks with the hope that they frequently would converge in a new conference championship game that, they believed, would prove far more appealing to fans, networks and those most important corporate sponsors.

The idea could be that if people so strongly detest the possibility of the annual Michigan-Ohio State skirmish getting lost in the melange of supposed October importance then they might more easily swallow having Michigan and OSU in the same division, still playing on the last Saturday with a full conference slate - but participating in a contest that, at best, would be nothing more than a Big Ten

championship "semifinal."

Is that the lesser of two disgusts?

That's what the U-M mob must ask itself.

What bothers fans the least?

"The reality is that we, as a fan base, are going to have to prepare ourselves for some changes," Brandon told the Econ Club. "There are going to be some compromises in how this works."

The least objectionable divisional alignment becomes keeping U-M and OSU together, keeping them on that traditional stage under graying November skies and maintaining at least one absolute - the certainty of playing end-of-season spoiler against your most loathed rival at the very least.

That would ensure that the Wolverines and Buckeyes would no longer specifically play for the championship. Gone would be the enduring visuals of roses between clinched teeth as the victorious celebrate the reward of a trip to Pasadena.

I don't think running around with an airplane to Indianapolis or Detroit or Minneapolis in your mouth and the title game seven days later would inspire the same spontaneity.

Do you really want that?

Brandon told me Sunday that protecting the significance of U-M/OSU was more important than protecting its timing. He hoped that maintaining a public dialogue over the next couple of weeks impressed upon the legions of doubters that keeping alive the possibility of the Wolverines and Buckeyes playing for the Rose Bowl every year was more important than the certainty of keeping November the same it had been for the last three-quarters of a century.

The proponents of such radical change will continue to gauge public sentiment because before finding out what hurts the least, you must first determine what bothers you the most.

By Drew Sharp, Detroit Free Press