Despite the Big Ten's leading teams stumbling out of the gate this season, commissioner Jim Delany thinks his conference is due for a rebound.

Speaking with ESPN, Delany said he was disappointed in his conference through the first two weeks of the college football season. Expected to lead the way for the Big Ten, Michigan, Michigan State and Ohio State all suffered losses and the latter two took significant tumbles in the AP Top 25 rankings.

Michigan State took a 24-18 lead into the second half against Oregon, only to be outscored 28-3 in the second half. As a result the Spartans fell six places in the rankings to 13th. After Ohio State lost to Virginia Tech 35-21 and fell 14 places to 22nd, the Big Ten no longer has a team in the ranking's top 10.

Though unranked, Michigan lost 31-0 to Notre Dame and did not receive a single top-25 vote. Despite Nebraska's two wins thus far, the Cornhuskers saw themselves falling off the top 25, leaving Wisconsin as the Big Ten's only team to not lose ground in the rankings, staying put at 18th.

"Big games matter on big stages with big ratings and a lot of attention," Delany told ESPN Sunday. "In the three primetime games, we didn't win any. That's disappointing. I would say this: I said they would be disproportionately impactful but I didn't say they would be dispositive. We're not feeling very good but the facts are the facts. I would just say with 50 percent of the nonconference games and 100 percent of conference games remaining, it's premature to make any judgments."

The Big Ten has not won a National Championship since 2002 and has posted a dreadful 8-29 record against the four other Power Five conference teams since 2010. Ohio State's hopes for making the College Football Playoff took a harsh dip when Braxton Miller, the team's Heisman hopeful, sustained a season-ending shoulder injury. Michigan State's did as well when Marcus Mariota and the Ducks' offense shredded their defense for 46 points.

Delany knows the deck seems stacked against the Big Ten, but he also knows there are plenty of games left to play.

"No doubt some games matter more than others," he said. "We still have more work to do. We just don't have those [wins] in our résumé. Others do. People can write what they want to write. It's America. But it's at a stage where the narrative is still developing.

"Anyone who writes the story of the 2014 football season after two weeks, that's premature."