Big 10 Tournament - First Round

Today the lower half of the Big 10 teams start their 4 day journey to try to force their way into NCAA Tournament.

Let’s take a look at the matchups and what might happen.

Minnesota - Northwestern

Northwestern is really, really bad.  Minnesota is the best team playing in the Big 10 on Thursday and the only Thursday team that could possibly maybe go to the NCAA Tournament without winning the Big 10 one (assuming they make it to the finals - and even that would be a stretch).  Tubby Smith will keep Minnesota composed and easily get past Northwestern and maybe even save up a little bit of energy for their game tomorrow.

Illinois - Penn State

Illinois has massively underperformed this year and Penn State has managed to keep playing pretty well despite losing their best player for the season earlier this year.  Pruitt and I went to the same high school and played basketball for the same coach (Coach Kerkman had been around forever long before I started playing) so I always hope he does well but am still happy when Illinois loses.  Penn State beat Illinois twice already this year.  Beating any team 3 times in a year is tough and Penn State might still be emotionally drained from their huge win against Indiana to end the regular season.  Illinois will play a little bit like the team people were expecting this year and win by 10+.

Iowa - Michigan

Common sense tells me that Iowa played so poorly down the stretch that they cannot possibly win this game.  Or maybe that’s just my heart’s way of keeping me from expecting anything.  Did you know that other than beating Northwestern twice, Iowa hasn’t beaten anybody else since beating Ohio State on Feb. 2?  Ouch.

Iowa also hasn’t played a game since March 4th.  I think the extra rest will help Iowa catch a second wind and spark a better shooting percentage and maybe even give them the legs they need to play some defense against Michigan in the second half.  Iowa beat Michigan the first game and lost the second.  But Iowa had a pretty good lead in the second game before they just completely fell apart in the second half.  If they have the strength to play the whole game, they should be able to get past Michigan.  Hopefully not playing this weekend was enough rest.

This should be a close game that either team will be able to win at the end.  I’ll pick Iowa with a final score of something like 65-60.

And the winners of these games have virtually zero chance of winning tomorrow - unless Iowa wins today, of course.