Big Ten Daily (Dec. 19): For Commissioner Kevin Warren, Making it to Finish Line an Accomplishment

Embattled commissioner Kevin Warren calls the season a success as it culminates with a controversial championship game on Saturday, Iowa's Kirk Ferentz has COVID, Nebraska beats Rutgers and the Pac-12 crowns a surprising champion.

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – This is been a very difficult year for first-year Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren. With all the stops and starts to the conference football season, he has been the direct target of most of the anger and angst from players, parents and media types.

But we've made it to the end of the 2020 Big Ten football season, somehow and some way. It hasn't been perfect – far from it, actually – but there's still been a lot of great story lines and we have a conference title game Saturday at Noon ET against unbeaten Ohio State (5-0), the winners of the Big Ten East, and Northwestern (6-10, which won the Big Ten West.

Warren sat down for an interview with Shannon Ryan of the Chicago Tribune. Here are the highlights of what he had to say:

— on changing the rules to allow Ohio State to play in the title game despite not playing six games:

“I have focused on this year being collaborative, being flexible and being nimble and recognize that changes do occur. I’m comfortable with where we are as a conference going into our (final games) and our Big Ten championship game.”

— on making adjustments to the Big Ten protocols on 21-day quarantines:  

“One of things we have done with our medical subcommittee, we have focused on the fact there’s new information regarding testing, vaccines. As medical advances become available it’s important for all of us to remain flexible, to remaining nimble and to remain collaborative and up-to-date with our decision making. One thing we will do is make sure we implement any requirements from our subcommittee in the best interest of the health and safety of our student-athletes. As always, I’ll follow the guidance and advice of our medical experts. We must remain flexible during all of these decisions.”

— on whether the season was a success:

“The way I look at this season is progress. We are playing intercollegiate athletics in a global pandemic. Any time we can afford our talented young people an opportunity to get a world-class education and play sports at a world-class level, I view this year as progress. I know we are a stronger conference today than we were a year ago. I look forward to a remaining 2020 and a bright 2021.”

Here is the link to the complete Chicago Tribune story: CLICK HERE

Iowa's Kirk Ferentz tests positive for  COVID-19

Iowa football coach Kirk Ferentz has tested positive for COVID-19, according to a university release. He initially tested positive Thursday as part of the Big Ten Conference's daily testing in return-to-play protocols. A PCR test confirmed the positive diagnosis.

The release said Ferentz, who is 65 years old, is asymptomatic and will remain home until Dec. 27. 

According to the Des Moines  Register, Ferentz was coughing frequently during a signing-day news conference with reporters Wednesday and again that night on his weekly radio show. 

Iowa is 6-2 with a six-game winning streak. The Hawkeyes' game with Michigan this weekend was canceled because of COVID issues at Michigan.

Nebraska ends season with win over Rutgers

Nebraska got a much-needed victory to end its season on Friday night when Adrian Martinez ran for two touchdowns and threw for another in a 28-21 win at Rutgers on Friday night in the kickoff to Big Ten Champions Week.

Dedrick Mills rushed for a career-high 191 yards as the Cornhuskers (3-5) denied Rutgers (3-6) a Big Ten-best four wins in a season.

"We had to set the story straight," said Martinez, who was 24-for-28 passing for 255 yards and carried 23 times for 157 yards in the Huskers' come-from-behind win. "We had to define this team's story in the last game and we came out in the second half and did that."

"We had to define this team's story with this last game...We're not perfect, far from it...But we're fighters."

- @MartinezTheQB spoke after @HuskerFBNation's win over Rutgers, plus gave well-earned credit to @MillsDedrick: pic.twitter.com/cHcqUQTgCS

— Nebraska On BTN (@NebraskaOnBTN) December 19, 2020

What does USC's loss mean?

The first of the conference championship games took place Friday night, and all three games were upsets. The biggest one was Oregon's 31-24 win over previously unbeaten USC, 31-24.

The Ducks, now 4-0 in Pac-12 title games, hadn't even qualified for the game, but when Pac-12 North winner Washington couldn't play because of COVID-19 positive tests, Oregon filled the void on Monday. And four days later, they were champions, taking advantage of five USC turnovers.

Oregon finishes the season 4-2 and now will be the league's representative in a New Year's 6 bowl, more than likely the Fiesta Bowl since the Rose Bowl is a College Football Playoff semifinal game site this year. It's very possible Indiana could be Oregon's opponent.

The bowl pairings will be announced on Sunday afternoon.

There were two other conference championships decided Friday and Ball State won the Mid-American Conference title with an 38-28 upset win over previously unbeaten Buffalo.

The Cardinals won their first MAC title since 1996, the year prior to the league championship game starting. They're the first Indiana team to win a conference championship game. Notre Dame has a chance to be the second later today in the ACC title game.

In the Conference-USA title game, there was another upset as well, when UAB beat Marshall 22-13. That one made me happy because I've spent a lot of time around UAB the past couple of years doing a book with Timothy Alexander, who was directly responsible for bringing this program back after it was shut down by its Board of Trustees.

Alexander was the first paraplegic to ever earn a full-ride college football scholarship and now he travels the country as a motivational speaker. His story was chronicles in the book ''Ever Faithful, Ever Loyal.'' that's now my all-time No. 1 best-selleing book for my book company Hilltop30 Publishing Group. 

It passed my Indiana basketball book ''Missing Banners'' last year. Both are great reads. Click the links to buy them on Amazon.

Related stories on Big Ten football

• PEYTON RAMSEY'S JOURNEY: Former Indiana quarterback Peyton Ramsey is ending his college career in style as a grad transfer at Northwestern. The Cincinnati native will take on Ohio State  today in the Big Ten Championship Game, helping turn around a team that was 3-9 a year ago. CLICK HERE
• PLAYER DEVELOPMENT KEY FOR INDIANA: The Hoosiers are ranked No. 7 in the country now, and their resurgence has been built on player development on both sides of the ball. CLICK HERE
• TOM ALLEN COACH OF YEAR: It came as no surprise that Indiana's Tom Allen was named the Big Ten's Coach of the Year by both the coaches and the media on Thursday. Indiana finished the season 6-1 and beat three nationally ranked teams along the way. CLICK HERE