INDIANAPOLIS -- The Big Ten will split its football teams into two divisions in 2011, when Nebraska joins what will be a 12-team conference, but some traditional rivalries will remain intact, and a conference championship game is ahead for Indianapolis.

After weeks of speculation and debate, the Big Ten announced on Wednesday night the new divisions.

The divisions keep some big football rivalries on the schedule yearly, such as Purdue and Indiana. Ohio State and Michigan will be in opposite divisions.

The divisions don't have names yet. A design and marketing firm is working on mock-ups, but most schools were able to preserve the game with their chief adversary while also adding some new texture to the new-look conference race.

Illinois, Indiana, Penn State, Purdue, Wisconsin and Ohio State make up one division, with Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Northwestern and new 2011 member Nebraska in the other.

"We want to see how it goes. We really want to see how the fans respond," Commissioner Jim Delany said during a 90-minute show on the Big Ten Network that revealed the divisions and schedules. "We're excited about it, and we think it does a pretty good job not only maintaining great old matchups, but also creating some great new matchups."

While the ADs looked at divisional models and dithered over what rivalries to keep and which ones to allow to fade into the background, there was a groundswell of opinion from fans who did not want the annual final-game showdown between Michigan and Ohio State eliminated or even moved around on the schedule.

The rivals have met in the last game on the schedule every year since 1943, frequently with a Big Ten title hanging in the balance.

Since they're in opposite divisions, they'll continue to play each other but might just get to do it twice -- the latter in the new Big Ten championship game to be in Indianapolis that matches divisional winners a week after their schedule date.

"It provides us the opportunity to have that great cross rivalry we want to have," Michigan AD David Brandon said. "But it also gives us the opportunity, when we both deserve it, to play for that chance to play in the Rose Bowl and for the national title."

"The Game" has decided the Big Ten champion 22 times. Smith said the uproar provided by worried fans had an effect.

"I can't imagine that it didn't," he said. "The conference office received probably half of the e-mails that we got and they were copied in. I've always said we have to listen to our customers and I'm sure the conference office did that." Perhaps the only downside to the new divisional play is that a couple of traditional rivalries - Iowa vs. Wisconsin for the Heartland Trophy, and Penn State vs. Michigan State for the Land Grant Trophy -- didn't make the cut.

Also, perhaps because everyone was clamoring to have the newcomers on their schedule, Nebraska's Cornhuskers face a daunting start. They open Big Ten play at Wisconsin and at home against Ohio State in early October 2011. Every bully on the block plays the Cornhuskers - Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Penn State right off the bat.

"I thought, 'Whoa, what are we doing here?'" former Nebraska coach and AD Tom Osborne said when he saw the first two schedules.

Even Osborne heard the pleas of desperate Ohio State and Michigan fans.

"I got an awful lot of mail here in Lincoln, Neb., about fans making sure Michigan and Ohio State played at the end of the season, and some of them were mad at me for (putting that in jeopardy)," Osborne said. "So I'm glad they got that worked out."

Delany believes the Big Ten got it right.

"We're going to be in divisions for the next 50 years, probably, and Nebraska is going to be with us for the next 50 or 100 years," he said. "Just like Penn State has been with us for the past 20 years."

That all sounds permanent. But the Big Ten may not be done adding new members.

"Some other conference could do something in the east and the next thing you know, we've got to respond," Smith said.

Indiana, Purdue Fans Generally Pleased

The Big Ten is getting bigger, and that's just fine with most fans in Indiana, especially since Purdue and Indiana University will play in the same division.

"I don't think there's any other way it should be," said Purdue fan Bryston Cutter. "IU and Purdue should play each other every single year."

"I'm definitely excited," said Indiana graduate Kaylin Dedinsky. "It's our biggest rivalry. It's the best weekend in the fall semester."

But some fans prefer the days when the Big Ten had 10 teams.

"I don't really like it, but it's here," said football fan Larry Kean. "Now we got 12, so we deal with what you got."

For local establishments, such as Scotty's Brewhouse, the Big Ten expansion should bring big business because the new conference championship game will be played at Lucas Oil Stadium

"That's going to be awesome for business when the title game is here in Indianapolis," said restaurant manager Grady Bass. "It's going to be absolutely fantastic."