2024-2025 B1G Basketball Thread

[bayareabadger]

Remember when 2018 MSU as a whole was less than the sum of its parts, because they had 2 NBA players, and won a Big Ten title, but every MSU was pissed?

Anyway how is Illinois doing?

That team was so, so weird. And the conference was baaaaaadddd.

[847badgerfan]

In the next couple of days, there should be an announcement about Woodson "retiring/resigning" effective at the end of the season. I know the rest of the Big Ten will miss him.

Football!!

[medinabuckeye1]

Big game for OSU tonight.  OSU has great metrics and a couple of good wins on the resume, but they just don't have enough wins overall yet to justify a tournament spot.  If they can pull off winning all the home games (Maryland, Washington, Michigan, NW, & Nebraska) and pick up at least one road game (Nebraska, USC, UCLA, & IU), they would finish 19-12 and that would probably be enough to get them in.
If they drop this game tonight though, they will probably have to pull off at least 2 or 3 or the road games to make up for it.

This tOSU team . . .

They've been on the bubble almost all season long and every time it looks like they'll move off it (either way) they reverse what they've been doing (good or bad) and stay on the bubble.  

From November 29-December 14 they:

• lost at home to Pitt
• Got mauled at Maryland
• Got annihilated by Auburn in Atlanta

It was starting to look like they would miss the tournament altogether then they won three straight including a 20 point blowout win in NYC over then #4 Kentucky.  

It was starting to look like they would be pretty safely in so then they lost four out of five including three home losses (MSU, Ore, IU) and with the lone win being a double-OT win over a terrible Minnesota team.  

It was starting to look like they would miss the tournament altogether then they won three straight with two of the three being on the road including a win over #11 Purdue in West Lafayette for Ohio State's first win there since the Truman Administration or something.  

Then, most recently, they led nearly the whole game in Champaign against #18 Illinois so it was starting to look like they'd be safely in so, of course, they completely collapsed in the Illinois game.  They went scoreless for more than five minutes to turn a five point lead at the U8 into an eight point deficit with just over two minutes to play and now here we are.  

Based on the season so far, my guess is:

• They'll get drilled by Maryland and lose at Nebraska such that everyone starts counting them out, then
• They'll win five straight (vsUdub, vM, vNU, @UCLA, @USC) such that it looks like they should be safely in, then
• They'll drop their last two (vUNL, @IU) to finish 18-13/10-10) and hit the B1G Tournament squarely on the bubble.  

[medinabuckeye1]

Based on the season so far, my guess is:

• They'll get drilled by Maryland and lose at Nebraska such that everyone starts counting them out, then

So far this has not aged well, Ohio State was down the entire game but took a lead with just over 2 minutes remaining.  They might not win but they aren't going to get drilled as it is a 1 point game with about a minute to play.  

[ELA]

Bank open late in Columbus 

[medinabuckeye1]

Bank open late in Columbus

?

[bayareabadger]

Bank open late in Columbus

Big bank challenge 

[ELA]

?

They banked in the winner

[medinabuckeye1]

They banked in the winner

Ah ok.  

So the Buckeyes are now 6-6.  They are two games down on the cut-line for the double bye and two games up on the cut-line for missing the BTT altogether so both of those things are getting pretty unlikely.  And they remain firmly on the NCAA Bubble.  

They are at Nebraska this weekend then they have a three-game home-stand with two of the three against bad teams (UDub 2-9, NU 4-8).  If they can win in Lincoln this could end up being a 5-game winning streak.  OTOH, they could also lose in Lincoln, lose at home to the Wolverines, and drop one of the easy ones.  With this team you really never know.  

I haven't done tiers because I just don't know what to expect.  

[bayareabadger]

Weird swing game tomorrow for Wisconsin.

They have eight games left, four they “should” win, three against high quality teams (with maybe the most vulnerable one at home). And then this game, a trip to Iowa.

[FearlessF]

defend the 3

[medinabuckeye1]

Lunardi's latest bracketology has 10 B1G teams in with only one (Nebraska) on the bubble:

• #2 Purdue
• #4 Michigan State, Wisconsin
• #5 UCLA
• #6 Michigan, Illinois, Maryland
• #7 Oregon
• #9 Ohio State
• #11 Nebraska

Nebraska is listed as one of the "last four byes".  The game in Lincoln between the Cornhuskers and the Buckeyes this weekend is pretty important from a bubble perspective.  As a #9 seed the Buckeyes aren't very safe so a loss for them pushes them back toward the bubble while a loss for Nebraska would be even worse since they are at home and already barely in.  

FWIW, those seeds typically result in:

• 6.51 teams in the R32
• 3.21 teams in the S16
• 1.33 teams in the E8
• 0.58 teams in the F4
• 0.20 teams in the NCG
• 0.08 NC's

A while back @ELA half-jokingly said that some #1 seed was going to be pissed to see Gonzaga/Ohio State as the 8/9 and in Lunardi's current bracket that is exactly what Duke would see.  #9 Ohio State plays #8 Gonzaga with the winner getting #1 DOOK in Raleigh.  

[FearlessF]

Go big red 

[ELA]

A while back @ELA half-jokingly said that some #1 seed was going to be pissed to see Gonzaga/Ohio State as the 8/9 and in Lunardi's current bracket that is exactly what Duke would see.  #9 Ohio State plays #8 Gonzaga with the winner getting #1 DOOK in Raleigh. 

In fairness I said Illinois-Gonzaga