What Up, What’s Haapnin: Big Ten Football Week 12 preview

HIT THE MUSIC!

It is time to give a Big Ten-centric preview of the upcoming college football weekend that declines to use stats or analysis and instead...deals only in vibes. This post is a shorter version of the old Big Ten Roast that I used to do (not last year though, because last year sucked and I didn’t really feel like cracking jokes) so hopefully you’ll tolerate this as much as you tolerated that.

No. 7 Michigan State at No. 4 Ohio State, Saturday, 11/20, 11:00 a.m. CT, ABC; OSU -19

Fans of Ohio State football are prime targets to get scammed by NFT art dealers. I can just see Big Nut being out $50,000 after trying to buy a digital monkey wearing an Ohio State helmet. God that dude, and NFTs, sucks shit.

Anyways, this is a Playoff Eliminator game for these two teams. Whoever loses will probably have the inside track for the Rose Bowl because OSU is definitely not losing to Michigan this year and MSU has already beaten Michigan.

Purdue at Northwestern (at Wrigley Field), Saturday, 11/20, 11:00 a.m. CT, BTN; Purdue -11

Wisconsin was supposed to play Northwestern at Wrigley Field last season and I really can’t decide how to feel about it not happening. Wrigley Field is an awful stadium to watch baseball, outside of it being old and famous, but the area around Wrigley Field (while also awful) is fun on a game day if your team is playing. I guess it doesn’t matter because I wasn’t going to go to the game anyways, but even if I still lived in Chicago (mere blocks away from Wrigley Field mind you) I’d probably still have to debate on spending all that money on a ticket to pee in a trough.

I also think that Joe Buck should kidnap Matt Millen and make it so Millen can’t call anymore football games. This is a good idea.

Rutgers at Penn State, Saturday, 11/20, 11:00 a.m. CT, BTN; PSU -17

It is amazing to me how far Texas has fallen. This is truly a program in disarray and it will take them years and years to dig out of this hole. Losing to Kansas in football is bad enough, but the Longhorns own coach has already suggested that he’ll need to fill a ton of scholarships due to how many players are going to transfer out.

If you missed the KU/UT game, just follow along in the video below where you can see by the reactions of this Jayhawks fan how the game is going. Texas in the SEC is going to be the funniest thing on the planet because they’re going to be, at best, the sixth best team in the conference and they’ll also be behind rival Oklahoma and “not rival” Texas A&M in the pecking order.

Brilliant stuff. Couldn’t be happening to a nice program.

Rutgers so badly wants to be Penn State’s rival in football and Penn State doesn’t even give them a second thought. It is the Don Draper elevator “I don’t think about you at all” scene come to life.

Illinois at No. 17 Iowa, Saturday, 11/20, 1:00 p.m. CT, FS1; Iowa -12.5

You’re gonna need a big coffin if you have to sit through the entire Illinois/Iowa game this weekend.

Nebraska at No. 15 Wisconsin, Saturday, 11/20, 2:30 p.m. CT, ABC; UW -9

Muffled Sounds of Gorilla Violence would be an amazing band name. I wonder what the second best gorilla joke of 1897 was? Were there so many gorilla jokes going around that they needed a contest to rank them all? Why don’t we make that many gorilla jokes anymore?

Speaking of jokes (nailed it), the Badgers play Nebraska this weekend and will be looking to beat the Huskers for the millionth straight year, and on Scott Frost Day!

No. 6 Michigan at Maryland, Saturday, 11/20, 2:30 p.m. CT, BTN; Michigan -15

It is still a complete shock to me when Michigan and Maryland play every season in football. I don’t know why it’s the Wolverines that send me for a loop when they play the Terps, and it doesn’t seem weird to me in basketball or other sports, just football. Whenever they realign the divisions the Big Ten needs to consult with me about which matchups just have bad or weird vibes.

I bet the Dutch government sends you these t-shirts so if they ever see you wearing it they can make sure you aren’t doing any more crimes. Become ungovernable, wear no shirt!

Minnesota at Maryland, Saturday, 11/20, 2:30 p.m. CT, BTN; Minnesota -7.5

Nothing but sadness awaits you in this game, so please watch this video instead. It has brought me nothing but joy since I first saw it on Wednesday afternoon. The sound the ball makes when it DRILLS the first girl in the face, the guy in the background hollering “NICE JOB” and “WALK IT OFF” as two of the players on the team he is, presumably, cheering for drop like there’s someone shooting poisonous blow darts at them, the “oooos” and “ohhhs” from the rest of the crowd...this video has it all.

I saw somewhere that PFF still has Minnesota ranked as their best offensive line in the country (!!!) this year. I hope someone shows that to Wisconsin’s defense next week.