Rutgers Football Cannot Be Saved from the Big Ten
Why the Scarlet Knights continue to get destroyed by the Big Ten, and why there’s no reason for them to leave.
Last Saturday, Rutgers’ redshirt freshman quarterback Johnny Langan produced one of the dreariest stat lines of all-time. Starting for his Scarlet Knights against Indiana, Langan completed 5 of 13 passes for one yard. That’s right — one yard.
Equal parts dismal and comical, the performance represented a new low for the university’s football team, a frequent victim of blowouts in the battle-ax that is the Big Ten.
However, Indiana is far from a powerhouse. The Hoosiers haven’t finished a season with a winning record since 2007 and haven’t won a Bowl Game since 1991. But that didn’t stop them from taking a 21–0 lead in the first seven minutes of the game, winning 35–0, and outgaining Rutgers an astounding 557–75.
Granted, this Indiana team has a chance to be better than in years past, but Rutgers still represented their first win in conference play and one which came embarrassingly easy.
For the Scarlet Knights, it was more of the same. Through four games in Big Ten play, they’ve been outscored by 30 or more in each game, and by a total of 165–7. Ouch. This comes with three undefeated opponents still on the schedule — Ohio State, Penn State, and a surprisingly 6–0 Minnesota team who are nearly 30-point road favorites at Rutgers this week.
At 1–5, Rutgers did manage to pick up a win in their season opener against FBS Independent UMass, but they’re unlikely to pick up another, even with teams such as Liberty and Illinois on the schedule.
However, despite their recent struggles, Rutgers has seen success in the past. In fact, Rutgers participated in and won the first college football game ever played. On November 6, 1869, the team, then known as the Queensmen, defeated the College of New Jersey (Princeton) Tigers 6–4 in the first of a two-game series split by the teams.
The game back then resembled soccer or rugby more than anything we would call football, but Rutgers has still competed every year there have been games. In more recent history, the Scarlet Knights saw a fair amount of success in the mid-late 2000s and early 2010s as a member of the Big East.
Notably, in 2006 under head coach Greg Schiano, Rutgers went 11–2, finishing 12th in the AP Poll and ending the year as the only team to beat Louisville.
Following the 2012 season, though, the Big East disbanded, with the conference’s non-football playing schools forming a new Big East with a focus on basketball, and the football schools forming the American Athletic Conference. After one season in the AAC, Rutgers accepted an offer to join the Big Ten starting in 2014.
This is where the modern troubles begin for Rutgers. Since joining the Big Ten, the Scarlet Knights have gone just 7–40 in conference play. Chris Ash, who took over as head coach before the 2016 season, was fired after the team’s 1–3 start this year, finishing his tenure with an overall record of 8–32.
So why did Rutgers join the Big Ten, anyway?
Located in New Brunswick, New Jersey, Rutgers is a geographical outsider to the Big Ten, which features mostly schools from the Midwest. But this is precisely what made Rutgers so appealing to the conference. By adding Rutgers, the Big Ten Network could get carriage in the New Jersey and New York markets, generating millions in revenue for the conference. This concept also led to them adding Maryland.
For Rutgers, leaving for the Big Ten was a no-brainer as well. The Big Ten pays out more money to its schools than any other conference and provided the university both prestige in getting to play against top-tier programs and security in the oldest major conference in the country.
Rutgers was never really supposed to be able to compete in football. To the rest of the conference, Rutgers’ inclusion was a way to make money and get free wins. So far, it’s all gone according to plan.
And it’s not like Rutgers can really complain. With revenue from the Big Ten Network, membership in the Big Ten is more lucrative than with any other conference. The real problem is that Rutgers isn’t yet receiving their full share of that money.
Through revenue sharing, Big Ten schools split the revenue generated by the conference annually. However, when schools join a conference, they have to gradually work their way up to earning a full share as they establish themselves as members.
Although Rutgers was initially expected to begin receiving a full share in 2021, that date has been pushed back to 2027. Furthermore, as of 2017, Rutgers was only receiving roughly 45% of what other Big Ten schools were getting.
This means not only is Rutgers playing in one of the top conferences in the country and arguably the strongest division in the country (the Big Ten West features Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, and Michigan State), they’re doing so while only receiving a fraction of the revenues of these schools. In terms of on the field success, it’s a recipe for failure.
Even in 2027 and beyond, Rutgers likely will remain towards the bottom of the Big Ten in football. I mean, just how are they supposed to compete against the likes of Ohio State and Michigan?
By then, though, they’ll at least have a chance. Currently, Rutgers is getting hopelessly slaughtered every week. Yet, despite this, there’s no reason for them to pack their bags with bigger pieces of the Big Ten pie in their future.
So when you’re forced to watch Rutgers get their butts handed to them, just remember the cause of the problem — TV money.
But hey — Rutgers punter Adam Korsak just won punter of the week for the third time this season, so that’s something, I guess.
Connor Groel is a writer who studies sport management at the University of Texas at Austin. He also serves as editor of the Top Level Sports publication on Medium, and the host of the Connor Groel Sports podcast. You can follow Connor on Medium, Facebook, and Twitter, and view his archives at toplevelsports.net.
