1. Rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise, and you will see a nod to Joe Tiller, the kindly old coach of Purdue. The letter incorporates two essential elements of the legendary Tiller persona: the trademark mustache and the ever-present costume bondage mask.
2. Those are clearly boobs. In graphic design school the first rule taught to incoming students is "be sure to put boobs somewhere in your design. People like boobs, even ladies and gay men. Boobs are the cornerstone of any design work, and a design that lacks them is not going to be liked or recognized as words by anyone. They may even find it hostile and threatening, and will begin to attack the design with anything they can find: farm implements, guns, fire, other people's limbs...the results, designers, can be serious and beyond the scope of your comprehension. Boobs are basic. In summary: boobs, boobs, boobs."
3. Continuing from the in-no-way-fictional monologue of a not-fictional graphic design instructor: "Rule two of graphic design school: Always work in a penis into your design, even if you have to give it a kind of jacked-up looking head. People love penises, even monstrous deformed ones." Also, this is a metaphor for Ohio State football: long, strong, and at the end kind of a disappointment.
4. This is actually a clever way of working Jim Delany's upcoming house plans into the design. Strictly ego-tripping on his part, but note that it does look like an overhead depiction of a 1970s office park. This is exactly what Jim Delany's house is going to look like. All-fluorescents and industrial carpeting, bitch.
5. Rotate 90 degrees to the left, and it looks like an 8-bit angry skull. This represents Notre Dame: stuck in the '80s, angry, part of the Big Ten's designs no matter if they want to be or not, and kinda dead.
6. Turn logo 90 degrees to right, and you will clearly see the head and raised ears of a mouse. THE BIG TEN IS DISNEY AND WE JUST PROVED IT OMG.
7. The Z is for Zorro. That guy's everywhere.