Big Ten Football Kicks Off On Friday – Here’s The Schedule

Almost two months later than normal, the Big Ten football season officially kicks off on Friday, October 23rd.

This year's Big Ten Football season will look a little bit different than normal due to the pandemic.  For starters, Big Ten teams will only be playing other Big Ten teams and the entire season will consist of 8 regular season games and 1 "Champions Week" game.

"Champions Week" will take place the week of December 19th and during that week, "each school from each division will match up with the school that finished with the same standing in the opposite conference, such that the first-place teams in each division will play in the conference championship, the second-place teams will play each other, and so on."

The first week of games will kick off on Friday night with Wisconsin hosting Illinois for a night game that will be broadcast on the Big Ten Network.

Friday, Oct. 23

• Illinois at Wisconsin at 8 pm on the Big Ten Network

After the Friday night game, the rest of the games will be played on Saturday starting at noon with MSU hosting Rutgers and Ohio State hosting Nebraska.

Saturday, Oct. 24

• Rutgers at Michigan State at 12 pm on the Big Ten Network
• Nebraska at Ohio State at 12 pm on FOX
• Penn State at Indiana at 3:30 pm on FOX Sports 1
• Iowa at Purdue at 3:30 pm on Big Ten Network
• Michigan at Minnesota at 7:30 p.m. on ABC
• Maryland at Northwestern at 7:30 pm on the Big Ten Network

The rest of the schedule was announced back in September and some kick off times have even been announced since then.

Most oddsmakers have Ohio State the favorites for winning the Big Ten Championship.