Big Ten announces Week 1 game times; Northwestern-Maryland set for 6:30 p.m.

The Wildcats will kick off their 2020 season under the Ryan Field lights, as the Big Ten announced the conference’s Week 1 and marquee game times Monday morning.

Northwestern’s first matchup of the shortened, conference-only 2020 season will take place October 24 at 6:30 p.m. CT at Ryan Field as the primetime matchup on Big Ten Network.

The conference will begin its season that Friday with an evening matchup between No. 16 Wisconsin and Illinois. On Saturday, Rutgers plays Michigan State while Nebraska and No. 6 Ohio State (lol) will face off at 11 a.m. before No. 9 Penn State takes on Indiana, and Iowa squares off against Purdue with a 2:30 p.m. start time.

The matchup between No. 19 Michigan and No. 24 Minnesota will accompany Northwestern and Maryland in the primetime 6:30 p.m. slot but on ABC.

In addition to the conference’s Week 1 schedule, the Big Ten also announced a handful of nationally televised marquee matchups throughout the season, three of which feature the Golden Gophers on Friday nights. On October 30, Minnesota and Maryland will hold the primetime spot on ESPN; on November 13, Iowa and Minnesota will be featured for the late game on FS1; and on November 20, Purdue and Minnesota will be shown on BTN. On November 27, Nebraska and Iowa will appear on either FOX or FS1. And finally, The Game (Michigan-Ohio State) will be shown on FOX on December 12th.

Despite this whirlwind of an offseason, Big Ten football is slowly creeping up on us. Now just 11 days out from the first conference game and 12 days from NU’s first matchup, all the puzzle pieces seem to finally be falling into place.