CHICAGO — The Big Ten has won three consecutive College Football Playoff championships, sent six programs to the CFP semifinals during that span and won 22 postseason games in the two-year 12-team CFP era. Yet the league has faced criticism that its middle tier doesn’t compare favorably alongside the rival SEC.This week at Big Ten media days, coaches and officials stood up for the conference’s depth. In the past two seasons against the SEC, the Big Ten won eight of 10 postseason games and won their three CFP matchups by an average of 24.7 points per game. Last year, Iowa and Illinois beat Vanderbilt and Tennessee, respectively, in bowl games while Indiana throttled Alabama in a quarterfinal at the Rose Bowl.“Illinois, a really good football team,” Indiana coach Curt Cignetti said. “Iowa, let me tell you, Iowa was one of the most underrated football teams in America last year. Minnesota’s won eight bowl games in a row. USC.“We let our actions speak for us. The things that we do between the white lines, and there’s a lot of other stuff out there, smoke and mirrors.”Iowa’s 34-27 win against 10-win Vanderbilt was a throwback-type bowl with only one player opting out of the game. Kirk Ferentz, who is the Big Ten’s winningest coach, snorted when he was asked about the SEC’s claims of dominance and joked, “I don’t have a lot of conference envy. I’ve never suffered from that.”“I know this: We play in a great conference,” said Ferentz, whose team finished 9-4 and No. 17 in the final AP poll. Vanderbilt, which finished 10-3, still was ranked higher than Iowa at No. 15. “With our team last year, I would have felt comfortable playing anybody, anywhere, anytime.”Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti chose to avoid making direct comparisons between his league and the SEC but stood up for his teams that landed outside the CFP.“This idea that the middle of our conference isn’t hard is just not right,” Petitti said. “Our teams are ready for the CFP. Our travel looks like the CFP travel. You’re going all over the country. How we play, the difficulty on the road in the Big Ten. I just think that’s overlooked.”This season, the Big Ten and SEC go head-to-head in three regular-season games, all in Week 2: Ohio State at Texas, Oklahoma at Michigan and Mississippi State at Minnesota. The leagues also have contracts to face off in the Citrus, ReliaQuest and Music City bowls, plus likely CFP matchups. — Scott DochtermanUnderwood’s learning curveBryce Underwood rarely gets a break from being Bryce Underwood. The spotlight that comes with being the nation’s No. 1 recruit and playing quarterback at Michigan with a massive name, image and likeness deal shines on Underwood 24/7. When he needs to get away from it all, Underwood has a hobby that helps him decompress: bowling.“I always watched my dad bowl,” said Underwood, who confidently proclaimed himself the best bowler on the team. “He used to curve the ball, and it didn’t go well for me. I learned how to do it one day and I never stopped.”First-year Michigan coach Kyle Whittingham said expectations might have been too high for quarterback Bryce Underwood (above) last season as a freshman. (Kamil Krzaczynski / Imagn Images)Michigan is hoping Underwood has a similar learning curve as a college quarterback. His first year as a starter was rocky, but coach Kyle Whittingham noted the extenuating circumstances: Underwood was an 18-year-old freshman who didn’t get much opportunity to develop. Michigan is banking that new offensive coordinator Jason Beck can unlock the potential that made Underwood such a coveted recruit.“The expectations might have been a little high for him last year,” Whittingham said. “I don’t know what people did expect, but he was able to win nine ballgames and put up some decent numbers. He knows and we know that those numbers have to improve, but given the circumstances, I thought he did some good things.”Underwood completed 60 percent of his passes with 11 touchdowns and nine interceptions while throwing for 187 yards per game. Underwood had a lot of work to do on his fundamentals, Whittingham said, particularly in refining his footwork. Underwood’s offseason included trips to Southern California to train with quarterback specialist Jordan Palmer and Bengals star Joe Burrow.“It was amazing just to watch how calm he was at all times,” Underwood said. “It was just real refreshing, honestly, to see some of the things I could take from him.” — Austin MeekRyan Day still wants schedule changesEight months after losing to Miami in a CFP quarterfinal in the Cotton Bowl, the Ohio State coach said that his team didn’t handle the nearly four-week layoff after the Big Ten Championship Game well against the Hurricanes. Ohio State fell behind 14-0 to Miami before losing 24-14.“We had a really good plan going into it, but I don’t think we played very well in the first half,” Day said. “We found ourselves in a hole and ran out of time, because we couldn’t finish things off.”While acknowledging that he, and his coaching staff, have to do a better job of preparing his players, he said he has voiced his concerns about the scheduling to Petitti. If Day had his way, the entire season would be moved up one week to narrow the gap between the end of the regular season and the postseason, move the semifinals to New Year’s and play the championship game a week after that.“That would allow us to end the season sooner, open up the (transfer) portal, finish the season and then put your roster together, which would all make much more sense to me,” Day said. “But it’s college football, so we’re going to adapt because nobody cares. We better figure it out, because we’re going to be in that situation again. Hopefully, really soon.” — Cameron Teague RobinsonA first for FitzgeraldThe first-year Michigan State coach returned to his hometown Wednesday to attend his 18th Big Ten media days. But this was the first where Pat Fitzgerald wore a green tie, not purple.There’s considerable curiosity surrounding the 51-year-old’s return to the Big Ten after a three-year exile following his ouster at alma mater Northwestern in July 2023 following an investigation into hazing allegations in his program. But he was quick to correct reporters who referred to him being “out of coaching.”“I’m not trying to minimize your question,” he said. “I just never felt like I was out of it.”Fitzgerald, who reached a settlement with Northwestern last August in his $130 million wrongful termination suit, spent the past three football seasons as a “volunteer parent” assistant coach at Chicago’s Loyola Academy. One of his sons, Ryan (now a walk-on at Iowa), was a quarterback for back-to-back state title teams in 2023 and ’24, and another son, Brendan, is a receiver there. (He recently committed to Michigan State as a preferred walk-on.)“I learned a lot. I’m a better teacher,” Fitzgerald said. “When you’re teaching a young guy how to run a curl route, and he’s like, ‘What’s a curl?’”Still, there are understandable questions how Fitzgerald will adapt to modern roster acquisition, which has changed dramatically since 2023. Michigan State signed 32 transfers this past cycle. But the Spartans coach believes coaching itself is timeless.“Guys want to be developed. They want to be coached,” he said. “Our staff motto is to be the best player development staff in the country.” — Stewart MandelChesney’s charm takes ChicagoBob Chesney was a big hit on Wednesday.The 48-year-old Pennsylvania native played and coached Division III football in his home state and coached at various levels in Georgia, Washington D.C., Maryland, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and for the past two seasons at James Madison in Harrisonburg, Va. And yet, the takeaway from nearly all who met him in Chicago was that Chesney appears a great fit at UCLA.Perhaps it’s that simple — he fits anywhere. And with anyone. He’s formed a bond in Los Angeles with Dave Roberts, manager of the Dodgers who served an adviser to the search committee that picked Chesney.Chesney also sought advice from Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay about handing the long distances that both of their teams must often travel to play on the road. The travel issue has kept Big Ten coaches on the West Coast up at night, worried over the logistics of long trips.UCLA’s new coach is unlikely to overthink time-zone jumps and circadian rhythms. McVay told Chesney that if the Rams play in London, “they just show up.”“They show up at 6 o’clock the night before the game, get up in the morning and play the game and go home,” Chesney said. “The belief is, they get in and get out and it never really hits them.”The Bruins play this year at Maryland, Minnesota and Michigan. For Chesney, who grew accustomed to long bus trips while coaching at the lowest levels of college, UCLA’s luxury travel, by comparison, seems manageable. — Mitch ShermanMutual respectFirst-year Penn State coach Matt Campbell and Ferentz, his Iowa counterpart, battled against one another for 10 seasons in the state of Iowa, and the coaches’ rhetoric generally featured muted respect amid the in-state rivalry. Now, with Campbell leaving Iowa State, the coaches are looser with their praise of one another. Ferentz called Campbell to Penn State “a great marriage” while the former Iowa State coach said, “my respect for coach Ferentz is second to none.”“I teased him this May in our spring meetings that I’ve been mad at him for a decade because I really had nothing to hate him about,” Ferentz said. “I just respect him as a coach and respect him as a person.”“I sat right by him and tried to pick his brain with as much knowledge as I could,” Campbell said. “Coach did the same thing when I was at Iowa State. He was always willing to sit and talk and listen.” — Dochterman‘I’m getting killed on Twitter’Nebraska hears the outside negativity after the Huskers lost consecutive games in lopsided style against Penn State, Iowa and Utah to end the 2025 season. Coach Matt Rhule kept a low profile this offseason. When he attended a New York Knicks playoff game in April at Madison Square Garden, some fans howled on social media that the coach should spend all of his time at work for the Huskers.According to Rhule, that’s exactly what he was doing.“I take a donor to the Knicks game,” he said. “I spend my own money to get the donor there. I get the tickets. We sit with the GM and the president. I’m doing all this in the service of the university, and I’m getting killed on Twitter.“You can say whatever you want, you can’t say I don’t work hard.”Last fall in working to generate visibility for his program, Rhule co-hosted a weekly podcast and made regular appearances on “The Pat McAfee Show.” He likely won’t do much of that this season, Rhule said. Of course, with players and staff, it’s impossible to block out all the noise.“If I could get everyone in our building not to listen to anyone outside of our building, I would,” Rhule said. — Sherman