Comprised of 14 schools, the Big Ten Conference is the second-largest power conference in the nation, behind only the ACC (15). The Big Ten is also one of the only conferences in the nation to follow a 20-game conference schedule, which cuts into the non-conference slate earlier and provides its member institutions with NCAA Tournament fodder that other conferences cannot match.
But a 20-game conference slate doesn’t divide evenly with 14 schools. Simple math tells you that each team will play every other team at least once, but then each team will play seven of those teams a second time as well.