Apollo Sports B1G Power Rankings: Preseason

The B1G is even more murky this season with the addition of the West Coast Foursome. Where does that place the Boilermakers in the preseason B1G poll?

The 2024 season of college football is inching closer and closer and although the release of EA Sports College Football 24 has held many in check, it’s almost time to start seeing the real thing. With the addition of UCLA, USC, Washington, and Oregon, the B1G has added two top flight programs, one that is seemingly on the rise, and another that is struggling to find its’ footing. They join the other fourteen schools to form one of the premier football conferences in the country and one whose footprint will be felt on Saturday’s from noon to midnight on a weekly basis.

This summer, I was asked to contribute a weekly B1G power ranking through Apollo Sports. This group, just like the new B1G, has a big footprint with two individuals representing each school from the B1G. I’m lucky enough to join Purdue sports journalist legend Mike Carmin to represent the Boilers in this illustrious group (that might be a bit of a reach, but we are going to roll with it).

I’ll be sharing my weekly ranking along with the odds and ends from the rankings as a whole each week. Lots to consider in these preseason power rankings and the transfer portal makes it a whole lot more difficult, but we’ll give it the old college try and see how terrible they turn out later in the season.

B1G Preseason Power Rankings:

Until proven otherwise, the Buckeyes and Ducks are the class of the B1G this season and I’m not sure there is much of a debate there. The real test comes after that where I am clearly much higher on the Hawkeyes than pretty much anyone else on this ranking system with only two others placing the Hawkeyes third and most other placing them fifth or sixth. With a defense that typically always keeps Iowa in games, the test comes from how they look without Ferentz’s son running a historically awful offense.

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The middle of the B1G continues to be an absolute slugfest but I’m not as high on the Wolverines as many others, even after their National Championship last season. Losing Jim Harbaugh and a multi-year starting QB are killers but the aura around the program is something to watch with more and more information about the signal-stealing saga continuing to swirl. I think that ends up being something tough to overcome at times and sees them fighting in the upper reaches of the mid-tier with the Badgers, Huskies, and Scarlett Knights (yes, Rutgers should be a pretty darn good football team).

The bottom of the B1G is downright pretty putrid although I do think Purdue and Indiana will be better than most believe. The Hoosiers likely have the best head coach in that program in over thirty years with a guy who has had success at every level (seriously, Google it…if you haven’t already heard him tell you thirty times to do so since he was hired in Bloomington). The guy is annoying and likely a bit arrogant for what that program at Indiana has traditionally been, but you have to appreciate the confidence he is bringing with him.

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The Boilers, under second year head coach Ryan Walters, has upgraded the talent level at nearly every position over last season. Transfers at key positions like running back, wide receiver, offensive line, defensive end, and cornerback will provide better depth than last year. Losing Tyrone Tracy (NFL) and Deion Burks (Oklahoma) hurts when those two were the two explosive players for a putrid offense at times last season, but getting a healthy Hudson Card back behind an offense line that should be head and shoulders better than last year is key. The Boilers very well could have a very good season this year and go 4-8 due to a really hard schedule in 2024.

The bottom of the barrel? Welcome to the B1G UCLA. Talk about a team who seems to have all of the resources to be good but just can never seem to put it all together. Even with Chip Kelly at the helm, they just never seemed to get themselves on track and that doesn’t seem to be the case either with first year head coach DeShaun Foster. Seriously, they hired Foster who was the running backs coach under Chip Kelly who they just fired. To put that in Purdue terms, it would have been like hiring Gerard Parker as the head coach. Just don’t see it working out for the Bruins.

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