Chris Holtmann expresses excitement for what Big Ten expansion means for basketball

This upcoming basketball season will mark the last one before the Big Ten Conference expands to 18 teams, as USC, UCLA, Oregon, and Washington will join in 2024 only elevating one of college basketball’s strongest conferences.

Ohio State head coach Chris Holtmann has his sights set on bouncing back following a disappointing season last year, but at Big Ten Media Days, he took a peek ahead at the future changes in the conference that are on the horizon.

“Yeah I’m excited about it Myron, I really am,” Holtmann said to ESPN’s Myron Medcalf. “I think our league is positioned as well as any league in the country and I think all those schools bring a different element. They’re all gonna be really exciting places to play for our guys to go and experience playing at some of those venues that are as iconic as they are in college basketball.”

Three of the four new teams joining the conference achieved 20 wins last season, headlined by a dominant UCLA team that’s done so in the last three seasons, as the competition within the league will undoubtedly elevate with the addition of some of the nation’s most consistent programs.

“They’re all programs that have experienced certainly highs and lows, but you look at a program like UCLA and they’ve had a phenomenal last couple years there with Mick [Cronin] so I think it’s a really good thing for our league. I couldn’t be more excited, I think I speak for most coaches,” Holtmann said.

Holtmann also spoke on one of the most relevant topics surrounding conference realignment as a whole. Various conferences will face a new challenge in 2024 as a multitude of teams will now have to travel across multiple time zones to play within their our league.

There’s no question that the new lack of regionality in the future with conferences will make scheduling, traveling, and balancing academics harder than ever for student-athletes across all sports. But Holtmann is confident in the leadership of the Big Ten to set up their programs for success amid the unprecedented changes on the horizon.

“The question that’s come up a lot Byron is the scheduling and how that impacts sports like ours, but I know that we have an incredible crew at the Big Ten that I think will take that all into account. There’ll be some challenges with it, but it’s well worth whatever challenges are gonna come,” Holtmann concluded.