Big Ten Media Days- Day One Notebook
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Written by T.J. Inman (@TJHoosierHuddle)
An annual rite of summer and a sure sign that football season is right around the corner, Big Ten Media Days commenced on Wednesday. Players, coaches and media members descended on Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis for the 2023 edition of the annual event with new Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti highlighting the first day of speakers.
Tony Petitti on Big Ten’s Future
“I’m excited about our future, with committed leadership from our council of presidents and chancellors and ADs, an energized conference staff, the addition of USC and UCLA, new and exciting media partners and expanded platforms, support from our coaches with the goal of winning national championships in all sports and a strong belief in the academic-athletic model, I believe that we are really just getting started.”
Tony Petitti when asked about future expansion
“All the direction I’m getting from leadership – our presidents and chancellors and our athletic directors – is to focus on USC and UCLA. We have a lot of work to do there, I’m proud of the scheduling format we created in football. I think it touches on all the right things. But we have significant work to do in scheduling for our other sports, especially our Olympic sports, to come up with the best solutions. I’m not getting direction to do anything else other than that in terms of what the conference looks like right now.”
Tony Petitti on NIL Issues
“I’ve learned a lot about what NIL is, and what NIL is not…what is happening now is not true NIL.”
Several Big Ten coaches took the stage to speak on Wednesday as well. Very few noteworthy or eye-catching things ever get said by coaches at the event but a quote from each is listed below:
Bret Bielema – Illinois
“We’ve got a lot of unfinished business. Last year, we were an 8-5 team, but that broke up into a 7-1 team and a 1-4 team. I focus myself on the 1-4 team more than any time in my career. Obviously, the losses all happened at the end of the year, so there had to be contributing factors that are on me as a coach and development and program-wise. I like where we’re at. I love the influx of talent.”
Bielema was also asked about the Barbie Movie. Truly hard-hitting stuff here folks.
David Braun – Northwestern
Interim head coach David Braun had no interest in discussing the hazing scandal that resulted in him taking the reins of the program in Evanston. Braun wanted to focus on the current players.
“Our number one priority moving forward will be ensuring that the student-athlete experience for our young men that we coach and mentor is just that – the ultimate student-athlete experience.”
Rutgers – Greg Schiano
“I’ve never been more excited to be the head coach at Rutgers University. I love what we’re doing. I love the culture that we’re building in our program. I love our players and coaching staff and how we’re handling business on and off the field.”
Michigan State – Mel Tucker
“We have a hungry, determined and very, very focused football team heading into preseason camp.” Mel Tucker believes this is the most talented and deepest roster he’s had at Michigan State in his time as the head coach.
Penn State – James Franklin
“We’re back to a more healthy roster than we’re used to. And now I think we’re in a position to give us the best chance to compete in our conference as well as nationally. Just less question marks across the board. You look at us on the defensive side of the ball, I think we’ve got a chance to be better up front with our defensive line. We are bigger. We are more athletic, we are physical. I think we have a legitimate three deep across the board.”
Iowa – Kirk Ferentz
“Probably the two biggest differences, certainly we’ve got a new quarterback coming in in Cade McNamara, probably the most significant change on our team will be the maturity of our offensive line. Looking forward to watching those guys compete. Defensively in a nutshell, we’re fairly veteran up front with our defense with our line, fairly veteran on the back end.”
Ohio State – Ryan Day
On potentially giving play-calling duties to Brian Hartline: “I certainly would like the opportunity for him to do some play-calling. How much? We’ve got to figure that part of it out. But we’ll get a feel for that as we get into August. The big thing about being an offensive coordinator isn’t just the play-calling, but the day-to-day organization of your staff, the corrections, the installs, the game plan. There are so many things that come with being a coordinator. One of the last things is the play-calling. He’s working through that.”
Big Ten Media Days will continue on Thursday and feature Hoosiers coach Tom Allen.