The Big Ten will officially expand to 18 teams next week.

Oregon, Washington, USC and UCLA will officially become members of the conference on Monday, bringing in a new era for what’s traditionally been a Midwest-based conference. From a football standpoint, the Big Ten’s newest round of expansion should immediately make the conference more competitive as Oregon enters 2024 as a major College Football Playoff contender while Washington is the defending national runner-up and USC has a history of competing for championships.

With that in mind, we thought this week would be a good time to take a look at how the Big Ten stacks up entering the 2024 season with a focus on the conference’s new teams and the teams that we expect to be Ohio State’s toughest competition for the conference title this year.

Both of us agree that Oregon will be Ohio State’s biggest challenger for the Big Ten championship this year while Penn State and Michigan round out the conference’s top tier of teams entering the 2024 season. Iowa, USC, Nebraska, Wisconsin and Rutgers – yes, Rutgers – are among the teams to watch in the second tier of the conference while Washington and Indiana are other teams we’ll be keeping an eye on in the Big Ten this year.

We spent the first 42-minutes of the show breaking down Ohio State’s competition in the Big Ten before concluding this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesday with some discussion about what’s been a very successful month of June for Ohio State on the recruiting trail.

The rundown for this week’s show:

• 0:00 Intro
• 1:25 Expansion Sacrifices Regionality But Makes Big Ten More Competitive
• 12:36 Oregon Will Be A Major Big Ten Contender in Year One
• 15:57 Penn State Has the Third-Best Roster in the Big Ten
• 18:38 Michigan Should Take A Step Back But Can’t Be Overlooked
• 22:55 USC Unlikely to Be Big Ten Championship Contender Right Away
• 25:49 Iowa, Nebraska Among Second-Tier Teams That Could Make Noise
• 29:11 Thanks to Schedules, Rutgers Could Finish Ahead of Wisconsin
• 33:32 Washington Lost A Lot of Talent But Shouldn’t Be Written Off
• 35:36 Indiana Has Potential to Make A Jump Under Curt Cignetti
• 36:39 Our Big Ten Championship Game Prediction
• 39:09 Our Big Ten Picks to Make the CFP
• 41:21 Why Ohio State vs. Michigan Could Have Very High Stakes on Both Sides
• 42:38 Ohio State is “Cooking” on the Recruiting Trail
• 43:59 Ryan Day Building His Best Defensive Recruiting Class
• 46:46 David Sanders Jr. is the Recruit Ohio State Must Land
• 51:26 Justin Hill, Dorian Brew, Defensive Tackles Among Ohio State’s Other Priorities
• 55:39 Taking More Chances on In-State Prospects Can Pay Off for Ohio State