Overall B1G Championship race thoughts.
The league has been playing 20 league games since the 2018/19 season, in that time here is what has been necessary to win the league, to get a double-bye (top-four seed), and to avoid playing on Wednesday (top-10 seed):
- 2019: Co-Champs were 16-4, 4th was 14-6, 10th was 3-way tie at 7-13.
- 2020: Co-Champs were 14-6, 4th was 13-7, 10th was 2-way tie at 9-11.
- 2021: Champs were 14-3 (reduced games due to Covid), 4th was 13-6, 10th was 2-way tie at 7-12.
- 2022: Co-Champs were 15-5, 4th was 3-way tie at 12-8, 10th was 3-way tie at 7-13.
- 2023: Champs were 15-5, 4th was 11-8 (Covid), 10th was 2-way tie at 10-10.
Four losses has always been good for a league title except when Michigan missed three games in 2021.
Six losses has always been good for a double-bye but you might sneak in with seven or even eight.
.500 has always been good enough to sit out Wednesday and two or three games worse might get you there as well.
I bring this up because 6-3 Northwestern visits Mackey tonight to take on 8-2 Purdue. Looking at the B1G races:
- 1 loss: Wisconsin
- 2 losses: Purdue
- 3 losses: Illinois, Northwestern
- 4 losses: none
- 5 losses: Nebraska, Indiana, Michigan State, Maryland, Minnesota
- 6 losses: Iowa, Penn State, Rutgers
- 7 losses: Ohio State
- 8 losses: Michigan
Northwestern is kinda the odd one. The teams with five losses are effectively out of the race IMHO. Granted, 15-5 has been good enough for a league title in three of the five years that we've had 20 game schedules but that would require winning out and is still no guarantee as it took 16-4 in 2019 and 14-3 in 2021.
That makes it a four team race and when you look at the four teams:
- Purdue: Ranked #2 nationally ok, checks out.
- Wisconsin: Ranked #6 nationally ok, checks out.
- Illinois: Ranked #14 nationally ok, checks out.
- Northwestern: If you look really close at the rankings you'll find them listed at the bottom under "Others receiving votes". Not sure about this one.
Can Northwestern actually contend for the title? I don't *THINK* so, but who knows. They have home wins over Purdue, Michigan State, and Illinois but when they've faced top-tier opposition on the road it has not been pretty. They lost in Madison and got drilled in Champaign (their other loss was in Lincoln). In theory they could still win the league even with a loss tonight but in practice I doubt it. I don't *THINK* they can take out Purdue in the Boilermakers' own building but we'll find out.
Just looking at the standings:
- If Northwestern wins tonight it is a 4-team race for the title and Northwestern is one of the four.
- If Purdue wins tonight it is a 3-team race for the title with Northwestern clinging to the periphery hoping the top-3 all drop a few games.
