The Big Ten ended up seeing a change at the top following the conference title game, as Indiana now supplants Ohio State.

The Big Ten is sending 12 teams to the postseason this year, with three teams participating in the College Football Playoff.

Is the Big Ten the best in college football? Considering the stakes and talent involved in Saturday's conference title game, the case may be too hard to argue at this stage of the season.

The Illini would seemingly be heavily favored against the Buckeyes, but that's not the reality – at least per ESPN's analytics

Indiana locked up its first outright Big Ten title since 1945 and the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff with a program-defining win over Ohio State

For the first time in more than a decade and just the third time since conference championship games were standardized, the nation’s top-ranked teams - Ohio State and Indiana - will play for a title.

Heisman Trophy candidate Fernando Mendoza didn't hold back his excitement with Indiana knocking off Ohio State in the Big Ten championship game.

Neither has come to fruition thus far. Even after the College Football Playoff moved to a straight-seeding format for the 2025 season, it still preserved automatic bids for the five highest-ranked conference champions -- adding even more motivation to win a title.

The Big Ten has the last two champs and the CFP’s top two teams — so why is the SEC still winning the TV ratings race?

The conference that is older than the NCAA itself once envisioned itself as a paragon of academic and athletic balance. It’s now known for unbridled expansion.

Those results, along with the first wave of conference play, helped to solidify the Big Ten hierarchy entering January. The impressive conference boasts four of KenPom's top 12 teams and 10 of its top 35, led by the dominant Michigan Wolverines.