2018-2019 B1G Basketball Thread

[medinabuckeye1]

Last night's results were as projected in the tOSU/M and NU/UMD games but the UW/UNL game was an upset.  

It seems that the injury and maybe something else are a MAJOR issue for the Cornhuskers because their last three games have been "upset" losses:

• They were projected to win at Rutgers on 1/21:  Lost by 7
• They were projected to win at home over Ohio State on 1/26:  Lost by 10
• They were projected to win at home over Wisconsin on 1/29:  Lost by 11

They have one positive upset (a 15 point in in Bloomington) and three negative upsets in the past nine days.  They need to move down one tier and the way they are playing right now, maybe two.  Moving them down to tier-5 impacts the projection for home games against tier-3 and road games against tier-6:

• vs UMD:  2/6
• @NU:  not played

Moving them down another tier into tier-6 would impact the projection for home games against tier-4 and road games against tier-7:

• vs UW:  Lost last night
• vs IA:  3/10
• @ IL:  2/2
• @ RU:  Lost 1/21
• @ PSU:  2/19

Based on that, I am going to go ahead and drop the Cornhuskers all the way down to tier-6.  

I'll address @RestingB!tchFace 's comments about Minnesota below but suffice to say for now that there simply isn't any reason to elevate them and he hasn't provided one.  

New tiers:

• Michigan, Michigan State
• Purdue
• Maryland
• Wisconsin, Iowa
• Indiana, Ohio State, Minnesota
• Northwestern, Nebraska
• Illinois, Rutgers, Penn State

All teams are within +/-1 except Illinois at +2

Updated projected final standings/BTT seeds:

• 18-2/29-2 Michigan (wins tiebreaker with MSU based on record against Purdue, no game in W. Lafayette)
• 18-2/27-4 Michigan State
• 17-3/24-7 Purdue
• 13-7/22-9 Maryland
• 12-8/20-11 Wisconsin
• 11-9/22-9 Iowa
• 9-11/19-12 Minnesota (wins tiebreaker over IU and tOSU based on record against Iowa, no game in Iowa City)
• 9-11/18-13 Indiana (loses tiebreaker to MN based on record against Iowa, beats Ohio State based on record against NU)
• 9-11/19-12 Ohio State
• 7-13/16-15 Northwestern
• 6-14/10-21 Illinois
• 5-15/15-16 Nebraska
• 4-16/11-19 Rutgers
• 2-18/9-22 Penn State

Based on those projections the match-ups at the BTT in Chicago would be:
Wednesday, March 13:

• #11 Illinois vs #14 Penn State, 9pm on BTN
• #12 Nebraska vs #13 Rutgers, 6:30pm on BTN

Thursday, March 14 (Pi Day):

• #5 Wisconsin vs IL/PSU, 3pm on BTN
• #6 Iowa vs UNL/RU, 9:30pm on BTN
• #7 Minnesota vs #10 Northwestern, 7pm on BTN
• #8 Indiana vs #9 Ohio State, 12:30pm on BTN

Friday, March 15:

• #1 Michigan vs IU/tOSU, 12:30pm on BTN
• #2 Michigan State vs MN/NU, 7pm on BTN
• #3 Purdue vs IA/UNL/RU, 9:30pm on BTN
• #4 Maryland vs UW/IL/PSU, 3pm on BTN

Saturday, March 16:

• M/IU/tOSU vs UMD/UW/IL/PSU, 1pm on CBS
• MSU/MN/NU vs PU/IA/UNL/RU, 3:30pm on CBS

Sunday, March 17:

• M/IU/tOSU/UMD/UW/IL/PSU vs MSU/MN/NU/PU/IA/UNL/RU, 3:30pm on CBS

[medinabuckeye1]

@MaximumSam :
At this point my only real concern for this year is that I hope the team can finish well enough to get a tournament bid.  I expect them to go absolutely nowhere in the tournament so I don't really care much about seed.  I just want to make it to keep the one year streak going because with the class we have coming in I think that they'll be able to keep it going past this year.  

[847badgerfan]

I was actually thinking tier 6 for UNL too. Glad we are on the same page there.

[Brutus Buckeye]

Grandstaff is a rapper now, iirc. 

[JerseyTerrapin]

So Maryland comes to Madison on Friday. This will be a tough game for UW.

I was going to say "So Maryland goes to Madison on Friday.  This will be a tough game for UMD."
both are probably true...

[medinabuckeye1]

@RestingB!tchFace :
This has been explained to you repeatedly and you have generally chosen snark and trolling rather than understanding and discussion but I'll give it one more shot:

First, as @ELA alluded to, the purpose of this tier-based projection system is mainly to do several things:

• To level out the sometimes severe differences in SoS.  I don't care that one team's record is better than another team's record until I look at who they have played.  
• To avoid overreacting to winning or losing streaks that are primarily a product of schedule.  Ie, if a team wins four straight it might mean that they are doing really well or it might just be that they played three home games and a road game against one of the conference's bottom-feeders.  Conversely, if a team loses four straight it might mean that they are having issues or it might just be that they played three road games and a home game against one of the top teams in the league.  
• To have a reasonably accurate projection of how the season will play out.  

Now onto Minnesota:  
Almost half way into the season they are a little above .500 at 5-4 in the league which, as you pointed out, is better than several teams that we have ranked ahead of them and the team that we have ranked even with them:

• fellow tier-5 team Ohio State is just 3-6
• tier-4 Iowa is 5-5
• tier-4 Indiana is 3-6

That is because our tier system is a little bit more sophisticated than simply looking at records.  As I mentioned above, I don't care about records until I look at who they have played.  In Minnesota's case their nine opponents/results are:

• 2 point road loss to tier-1 Michigan
• 15 point home loss to tier-3 Maryland
• 7 point road win over tier-4 Wisconsin
• 5 point home win over tier-4 Iowa
• 20 point road loss to tier-5 Ohio State
• 7 point home win over tier-6 Nebraska
• 27 point road loss to tier-7 Illinois
• 1 point home win over tier-7 Penn State
• 18 point home win over tier-7 Rutgers

The two bolded results are "upsets" by which I mean that the tier system projected the opposite result.  The other seven games all resulted in what we would expect for a tier-5 team.  

You have talked a lot about Minnesota's road win over Wisconsin.  That is a nice win, no doubt about it.  You have failed to address Minnesota's 27 point loss to Illinois.  That is a bad loss.  From my perspective, they cancel each other out.  Minnesota has one positive upset (the win at Wisconsin) and one negative upset (the loss at Illinois) and they have exactly the record that we would project for a tier-5 team at this point in the season.  

Wisconsin has the upset loss at home to Minnesota.  We know that.  They also have two positive upsets.  They beat the Wolverines and they won in Iowa City.  Thus, Wisconsin is ahead of where we would project them to be and we now project them to finish 12-8.  

Minnesota will get moved up if, and only if, they win some games that they are not projected to win.  Going forward:

• vIL tonight - projected win
• @PU on 2/3 - projected loss
• vUW on 2/6 - projected win
• @MSU on 2/9 - projected loss
• @UNL on 2/13 - projected loss
• vIU on 2/16 - projected win
• vM on 2/21 - projected loss
• @RU on 2/24 - projected win
• @NU on 2/28 - projected loss
• vPU on 3/5 - projected loss
• @UMD on 3/8 - projected loss

We project that your Gophers will go just 4-7 in their last 11 games.  Maybe you are right and they'll do better than that.  If they win some of those games that we project them to lose (and don't lose offsetting games that we project them to win) then we'll adjust accordingly.  For now, there isn't any reason to elevate them because the two upsets offset and they are exactly where we would project them to be.  

[ELA]

SG Jaquan Lyle was the most talented but had the iffiest head, and was eventually kicked off the team.  He landed at New Mexico, but ruptured his Achilles before the season started and has yet to suit up.

Per Mark Titus, Lyle was partying in Columbus almost immediately after getting his UNM diagnosis FWIW

[ELA]

I was actually thinking tier 6 for UNL too. Glad we are on the same page there.

Yeah, I'm not sure if they were heading here without the Copeland injury anyway, but without him, they simply have no size.  At least no size that should be out on the court trying to guard Ethan Happ.

[medinabuckeye1]

I was actually thinking tier 6 for UNL too. Glad we are on the same page there.

I hesitated because I don't usually move teams two tiers at once but considering that their last three games were "upset" losses (based on their old tier) and the injury to Copeland it appears to be justified at this point.  

[Brutus Buckeye]

Mark Titus is still a thing?

[ELA]

Mark Titus is still a thing?

He hosts a great college basketball podcast.  I would highly recommend it.

[RestingB!tchFace]

@medinabuckeye1 

Ok.  Thanks for the explanation.  I think it's still pretty janky, but who knows.  Indiana has lost six straight and is tier 4.  I guess.

[medinabuckeye1]

Minnesota will get moved up if, and only if, they win some games that they are not projected to win.  

To clarify this:
We don't generally look at moving teams unless they get to +/-2.  For example, I moved Nebraska down because they were at -2.  Currently 13 of the 14 teams are within +/-1.  The lone exception is Illinois which is currently +2.  The same applies to Minnesota.  We probably will not look seriously at moving them unless/until they get to +2 or -2.  Presently they are even (one positive upset and one negative upset) so they would need to win two of their projected losses without taking a loss in any projected wins before we started talking about moving them up.  
There is an argument for moving Illinois up and that would help Minnesota by eliminating their negative upset.  As mentioned, Illinois is at +2.  Moving them up into tier-6 would impact the projections for their home games against tier-5 teams:

• Ohio State:  Lost by 10 on 12/5 (Note, this was actually a neutral site game in the United Center)
• Minnesota:  Won by 27 on 1/16
• Indiana:  March 7

[medinabuckeye1]

@medinabuckeye1

Ok.  Thanks for the explanation.  I think it's still pretty janky, but who knows.  Indiana has lost six straight and is tier 4.  I guess.

I made a typo on the earlier post, Indiana is actually tier-5.  I have fixed it.  
As far as Indiana's six straight losses, two were against Michigan, one each at Maryland and Purdue.  Those four are games that most teams in the Country would lose, they are just really tough games.  The other two (vUNL, @NU) are more questionable but we projected the road loss at NU.  Thus, while they have lost six straight only one is an "upset" and that is their only upset this year so we'll wait and see if they take another negative upset.