Big Ten Fines Michigan, Ohio State $100K Each for Role in Melee
The Ohio State Buckeyes playoff chances were still quite good following the loss to Michigan Saturday that resulted in a postgame melee.
Ohio State's shock loss opened up the door for the Penn State Nittany Lions to punch their ticket to the conference title game versus the Oregon Ducks.
The Buckeyes should stamp their ticket into the CFP as an at-large team, but now they are subject to the seeding by the college football playoff committee. They fell to No. 8 in the rankings on Sunday.
"[T]he Buckeyes will likely still find a place in the College Football Playoff come Sunday, Dec. 8 when the field is announced," CBS Sports Jerry Palm wrote on Saturday.
"The absolute floor for Ohio State in the College Football Playoff Rankings is No. 10 Indiana despite the fact the Buckeyes will potentially finish with one more loss than the Hoosiers. They have two top-10 wins, one of which was a dominant 38-15 victory over Indiana just last week. "
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Big Ten Fines Michigan and Ohio State
The Big Ten fined Michigan and Ohio State $100,000 each on Sunday for their football programs' roles in the postgame melee following the Wolverines' stunning 13-10 upset of the No. 2 Buckeyes at Ohio Stadium, the league announced.
In a statement, the league said it "considers this matter concluded and will have no further comment." The league doesn't plan to suspend players for their roles in the fight, and Michigan and Ohio State officials said no individual discipline is being handed out by them at this time.
In its statement, the Big Ten said the teams violated the league's sportsmanship policy.
"Not only did the actions of both teams violate fundamental elements of sportsmanship such as respect and civility, the nature of the incident also jeopardized the safety of participants and bystanders," the Big Ten statement said.
Ohio State released a statement Sunday saying it respects the Big Ten's decision.
"What happened post-game yesterday was unfortunate," the statement said. "Good sportsmanship is always important in everything we do at Ohio State. Moving forward, we will continue to examine and address our post-game protocols to ensure our student-athletes, coaches, visiting teams and staff safely exit the field."
The Wolverines planted their flag at midfield in The Horseshoe following their fourth consecutive victory over the Buckeyes. A five minute fight ensued. Reports of pepper spray being dispersed also surfaced during the melee.
Ohio State had come into this game as a -19 point home favorite.
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