Big Ten Conference

On June 11, 2010, the Big Ten Conference announced that its member schools voted unanimously to accept the University of Nebraska as the conference’s 12th member beginning on July 1, 2011.

Big Ten Conference is an association of world-class academic institutions with shared values and goals. Since its inception in 1896, the pursuit and attainment of academic excellence has been the priority for every member institution. However, maintaining the conference’s status as one of the preeminent athletic conferences in the country also endures as an important component of the Big Ten student-athlete experience. Recognized as one of intercollegiate sports’ most successful undertakings, the Big Ten strives for success from its student-athletes not only on the field and in the classroom, but around the world as well.

• www.bigten.org
• Big Ten universities provide over $136 million in direct financial aid to nearly 10,000 student-athletes, more than any conference
• The Big Ten sponsors 25 official conference sports, 12 for men and 13 for women. The 26th conference sport, men’s ice hockey, will begin in 2013
• During the 2011-12 season, the Big Ten claimed seven team national championships, including titles for Illinois men’s gymnastics, Minnesota women’s ice hockey, Northwestern women’s lacrosse, Ohio State fencing and synchronized swimming, Penn State wrestling and Wisconsin men’s cross country
• The Big Ten led all conferences with national titles in 12 different NCAA-sponsored championships from 2002-03 to 2011-12. Over that time period, the Big Ten produced championships in cross country, fencing, golf, gymnastics, ice hockey, lacrosse, soccer, softball, tennis, track and field, volleyball and wrestling
• Big Ten fans are some of the nation’s most supportive, with more than 10 million patrons attending conference home contests during the 2011-12 seasons for football, men’s and women’s basketball and volleyball alone
• Big Ten institutions have approximately five million living alumni and nearly 350,000 undergraduate students attending their universities.
   

• www.btn.com
• www.btn2go.com
• Membership in the Big Ten also gives Nebraska coast-to-coast television exposure on the Big Ten Network, meaning the friends and family of a Nebraska student-athlete can see a majority of their athletic competitions.
• Headquartered in Chicago, the Big Ten Network is the first internationally distributed television network dedicated to covering one of America’s premier collegiate conferences.
• With more than 350 live sports events, and virtually all of them in high definition, the Big Ten Network is the ultimate destination for Big Ten fans and alumni across the country. The network is on the air 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
• The network is available to an estimated 80 million households, through agreements with more than 300 cable/satellite affiliates.
• In 2011, every Big Ten home football game was nationally televised. Including road and neutral games, 98 percent (94 of 96) of Big Ten games were televised nationally and the other two road games appeared on ESPN3.com.
• Since the current media agreements began in 2007-08, every home football and men’s basketball game has been produced while women’s basketball has received more coverage than any other conference
• The Big Ten’s new media agreements have resulted in the broadcast of nearly 1,000 events nationally and regionally on an annual basis, compared to 300 events in the final year of the previous agreements