Another weekend, another slate of questionable results for the Big Ten. Losses were the norm again, dominating a weekend where Big Ten teams combined for two wins and a tie. This weekend marked the end of full non-conference play, as the Big Ten enters conference matchups next week. While it’s way too early to look at PairWise rankings, these non-conference losses will hurt Big Ten teams later in the season – as it did last year.

After last week’s age limit proposal, there’s been a lot of controversy around the Big Ten. Ironically, as one fan pointed out, Minnesota’s third-string goaltender Brock Kautz is a 21-year-old freshman. And sophomore Nick Lehr, the backup goalie who replaced Eric Scheirhorn, was born in 93 – making him a 21-year-old when he was a freshman as well.

There wasn’t much new to learn about the Big Ten this year, expect Ohio State has continued scoring. The Buckeyes have now notched four or more goals in four of its last five games. Michigan is still inconsistent, Minnesota is still struggling and so far Penn State has fared the best out of conference.

Also, Nick Seeler was suspended one game for a malicious headshot against St. Cloud’s Niklas Nevalianen.

(After the jump: Reinforcing thoughts about Michigan, Minnesota’s mistakes and who’ll finish first in the Big Ten.)

We knew this would happen with Michigan

I don’t know if any Big Ten team has been more inconsistent lately than Michigan, and a monster win followed by a tie with Dartmouth last week proves that. The Wolverines have split each of their last three series. That isn’t an issue, but it’s odd to score seven goals one night against Dartmouth and to score one the next. Or to score five on Robert Morris and then get shut out the next night.

I thought the Big Ten was Michigan’s to lose, despite lack of goaltending and the inconsistency. The a Wolverines had an offense to be feared, and I thought it was enough. Given the state of the Big Ten, it probably still is.

But what I’ve seen from Michigan so far isn’t reassuring. I thought they’d be better against non-conference opponents.

Minnesota’s mistskes is is costing the team

Last night, Ryan Collins turned the puck over to a St. Cloud player who was right in front of him. The Huskies turned it around for a 3-on-1 and a goal from Kalle Kossila gave SCSU the 1-0 lead. Collins’ turnover was really ill-timed. Eric Schierhorn was eventually chased from the net, although I’m not sure how you’re supposed to defend against a play like that. Mistakes and turnover will happen, but this reminded me of earlier in the season. Turnovers were a big issues for Minnesota back then, making things tough for a rookie goaltender.

Then there was Seeler’s five-minute major. The Huskies took the game over that period with a couple of tallies, and the Gophers couldn’t recover. I don’t want to call Seeler’s penalty a “mistake,” because it didn’t look like a mistake. But the five-minute major was killer for the Gophers, who were hanging in the game.

Picking a Big Ten winner

I might have been the only person who didn’t pick Minnesota to finish second. I really can’t tell at this point how each team will fare against each other, but based on last year I do like Penn State to finish second. The only variance I have from my preseason poll is that Ohio State has a good chance of finishing last instead of Wisconsin.

Tuesday, December 1st, 2015 - 9:00 am | Big Ten, Blogs, Notes, Thoughts, Ramblings