CBS Sports Ranks Michigan State Vs. Ohio State The Best Modern Day Big Ten Rivalry
By: Evan Jankens
@kingofthekc
I would assume when Michigan Wolverine fans saw the headline they scoffed and said "This is just clickbait."
Clickbait is something this blog isn't.
CBSSports.com put out a story titled: "Forget history, these are the best modern college football rivalries." I had to see what this story was all about. Shockingly, Chip Patterson who wrote the story has a different rivalry ranked first.
Michigan and Ohio State has notoriously been known as the top rivalry in all of sports, but the team from Michigan in the rivalry with the Buckeyes is from East Lansing and not Ann Arbor.
Patterson explains himself well and below are some excerpts from the story:
Michigan fans disagree, obviously, as do some Buckeyes. The Big Game wins over time, sure, but in this moment Sparty-Buckeyes is the premiere Big Ten conference game. It's one that gets circled by all college football fans a week or two in advance to avoid missing the next chapter of the Mark Dantonio-Urban Meyer rivalry.
College football's best modern rivalry escalated to a new level in a disappointing loss for the Buckeyes that was also a program-changing win for Mark Dantonio and Michigan State.
There's just not a modern rivalry in college football that has combined winning at the highest level with the ultimate drama over the last four years than the Meyer-Dantonio era of Ohio State-Michigan State.
It's tough to argue there is a bigger rivalry in the Big Ten right now. You can't really rank Michigan and Ohio State as the top rivalry since over the past 10 years Michigan is 1-9 against their top rival. You can't really rank Michigan and Michigan State as the top rival since Michigan is 3-7 against the Spartans the last 10 years. What other big rivalries are there in the Big Ten?
Maryland wants to be Penn State's rival but that's tough to top MSU and OSU; Iowa and Nebraska is a cute rivalry but doesn't come close in comparison.
Other games that made the CBS Sports list are Clemson vs. Florida State, Alabama vs. LSU, Stanford vs. Oregon and Baylor vs. TCU.
Now it's time for the Big Ten fans to tell me what they think, is Michigan State and Ohio State the best rivalry in the Big Ten?
