Realignment!

I'm pretty excited right now.  Things seem to be falling in to place.  Am I ready?  No.  But I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm pretty much a generator and a tent away from the finest offseason in my personal tailgate planning history.  For those in the crew, I couldn't be more excited to see your reaction to our new tailgate home.

And then today the rumors began to swirl about the conference realignment.  Doug Karsh broke the story, confirming the rumors through his personal inside source just after lunch.  We are in a division made up of the three teams of the west: Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska....then add in Sparty and Northwestern.  The Game remains at the end of the season.  I quipped earlier that the end of The Victors will finally make sense.

Everybody wins.  And for those in the "everybody loses" camp, the only way to fix your issues is to have Michigan and Ohio State play every year in the Big Ten Championship Game despite their records, the rest of the conference be damned.

Next year's home schedule is just phenomenal.  The ND night game to start...Nebraska and Ohio State to finish.

But 2012?  Not so great for a traveler like me.  Someone explain to me how to manage @ Nebraska followed by @ Minnesota?  10 years I've been rocking the home and away games, and every year I'm dying for a new stadium.  Never happens.  Now they're going to give me two in two weeks?

I will let the guys with the beer provide the summary.

Anyway, I give the whole thing a great big thumbs up, and it makes me want to be competitive.  This has to work.  This has to work right now.  I don't want to be re-rebuilding when the league is reborn a juggernaut.

Must win.

Two days.  My god...two days.