If Big Ten adds a 9th game should it be a protected rivalry?

[NYBuckeye96]

If the Big Ten adds a 9th game in 2017 as has been discussed, should the additional game be a protected rivalry?

If the Big Ten were to expand again, it definately should NOT be a protected rivalry otherwise teams would go years and years without playing each other.

But, if the Big Ten stays at 12 schools for the forseeable future, should the extra game be protected? I thought of a great way this could work and make the Big Ten have more big games to increase TV revenues, but there are definate drawbacks to this as well.....

Since we have the "Big 4", we could create more media attention by ensuring they always play each other. So the second protected game, we could have....

Ohio State - Nebraska
Penn State - Michigan

The next two successful teams, Iowa and Wisconsin, could then become a protected rivalry, which both teams would like to have anyways.

Wisconsin - Iowa


And then the bottom 6 schools you could divide accordingly based on overall success. Since Minnesota and Indiana are often at the bottom of the standings, make them a protected rivalry.

This way we now have more "must see" games in the Big Ten which would increase the value to what the brand would be worth to the TV companies who pay the millions to have the media rights to air games.

Since the top programs would be facing each other every year and have a strong strength of schedule, the non-conference games could be played against anyone really, so if OSU wanted 3 MAC schools to come to the Shoe every year, so be it.

One downside to this would be that in most years, it would assure the Big Ten Championship Game was a rematch of a game that had already been played that season.

Just a random thought that I had that could make things interesting in the Big Ten.

[CLane]

Leaders
Ohio State
Penn State
Wisconsin
Illinois
Purdue
Indiana

Legends
Michigan
Nebraska
Iowa
Michigan State
Minnesota
Northwestern

Cross-Division Protected Rivalries
Michigan-Ohio State
Penn State-Nebraska
Minnesota-Wisconsin
Northwestern-Illinois
Purdue-Iowa
Michigan State-Indiana.

Here is a good article from 2008: http://espn.go.com/blog/bigten/post/_/i ... -rivalries

The "protected rivalries" from 2008: (Are they the same in 2011?)

Illinois: Indiana, Northwestern (OK)
Indiana: Illinois, Purdue (OK)
Iowa: Minnesota, Wisconsin (Lost Wisconsin)
Michigan: Michigan State, Ohio State (OK)
Michigan State: Michigan, Penn State (Lost Penn State)
Minnesota: Iowa, Wisconsin (OK)
Northwestern: Illinois, Purdue (Lost Purdue)
Ohio State: Michigan, Penn State (OK)
Penn State: Michigan State, Ohio State (Lost Michigan State)
Purdue: Indiana, Northwestern (Lost Northwestern)
Wisconsin: Iowa, Minnesota (Lost Iowa)
=============================================

I thought this might aid in the discussion....