Obviously the Big Ten hasn't shown well in this tournament... But with some of these upsets, do we really believe it's all that strong of an indictment of the league?
I haven't watched most of them closely, except obviously the Purdue game. Credit goes to UNT's gameplan, because they did a great job keeping Purdue's bigs from establishing themselves. But beyond that, did they really "outplay" Purdue? I don't think so... I think they out shot Purdue. Purdue pulled off the "look like you forgot what time the game starts for the first 20 minutes and then come out after halftime a completely different team", and that has plagued them all year.
UNT was 50% from 2pt and 42.9% from deep. Purdue was 41% from 2pt and 30% from deep. Purdue outrebounded UNT 39 to 32, with a massive lead in ORB of 20 compared to 8, and all other statistical categories were pretty close.
It came down to getting the ball through the hoop, and when you have a terrible shooting day while your opponent is making everything, it's not going to end well.
Even with UNT having the right gameplan, I'll bet if you put those two teams into a simulation, Purdue wins 8 of 10.