OPINION

By Dave Curtis

updated 2:24 p.m. ET Sept. 10, 2008

When the Big Ten's football coaches convened this offseason, the conversation turned hard toward the league's perception. There was no crisis of confidence in-house — the guys in charge still thought their football ranked with any brand in the country.

But the 11 millionaires admitted that the league's profile needed a national boost to keep morale from sagging further.

"The perception is reality," Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez said Tuesday on a teleconference. "We said the best way, as coaches, to change it is to go win some big games."

Which brings us to Saturday, when two-time defending Big Ten champ Ohio State visits Pac-10 kingpin Southern California.

It's by a country mile more attractive than any other nonconference, regular-season game in 2008. And it's the precise opportunity the league needs to prove it still belongs among the best of the best.

To review, the Big Ten hasn't quite resembled the '85 Bears in its recent forays against college football's elite. The conference hasn't posted a winning record in bowls since 2002. Four straight BCS bowl losses, by a combined 160-73, have bruised the leak cheeks.

Last year provided some body blows, too, both in the spotlight (Michigan's home losses to Oregon and Appalachian State) and out (Northwestern loses to Duke, Iowa to Western Michigan).

Those results have spawned discussion over what's wrong with the guys from Mount Nittany to the Metrodome. Too slow on the edges? Too gutless when down a couple scores? The coaches in those meeting rooms disagree.

"It's very early in the season for all of us," Indiana's Bill Lynch said. "To say the winner of the football game determines the perception of the conferences isn't quite fair."

Lynch, apparently, is out of the message board/blog/sports bar loop. Discussions like these define college football, making the game a national one and keeping it relevant even on Flag Day. Non-conference results help define how poll voters rank teams. They sway recruits to look south and west for landing spots. And they make the next Big Ten team faced with a huge out-of-league challenge to wonder whether they'll simply get steamrolled, too.

History tells us an Ohio State loss doesn't disqualify the Buckeyes from reaching a third straight national championship game (though it would become a pretty difficult quest). But "USC 35, OSU 17", or something of that ilk, means the playing-small-in-big-games stigma sticks with the Buckeyes at least until the first week of January.

And for the good of the league, the Big Ten's model program needs to make the stigma disappear. The conference needs to take a swing at the bully, bloody his nose and win some respect from the crowd gathered to watch. The ingredients are there for such a victory — a solid offensive line, one of football's best back sevens, a gigantic advantage in the kicking game.

Now it's up to OSU to slap together a strong 60 minutes and score one for a conference that's been shut out on the big stage for a long, long time.

"We can't change what people say," Buckeyes receiver Brian Robiskie said. "All you can do when you get opportunities like this on a stage like this is go win."

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