Big Ten basketball Update and Power Rankings

There is only one team in the Big Ten which can claim it has won in the two toughest environments – Purdue and Michigan State.

That’s Northwestern.

The Wildcats still have a lot of work to do in order to impress the NCAA selection committee. While the selection committee maintains it never takes a program’s history into account, then that should bode well for the Wildcats who have never been to the NCAA tournament.

But consider what the Wildcats have done this season.

They beat the conference-champion Spartans in East Lansing, runner-up Purdue at West Lafayette, beat Minnesota when the Golden Gophers were ranked and beat Ohio State for the first time since 1998. Included in their non-conference resume is a nice win over No. 24 ranked Florida State.

And consider that the Wildcats (17-11, 8-9) had to rally back from a 1-4 start in conference play.

What hurts is a pretty soft non-conference schedule that included the likes of SMU, Brown, Central Arkansas and others.

If the Wildcats are going to make their push, a win at Ohio State in Columbus on March 7 and a win or two in the conference tournament would make it difficult for them to be left out of the party.

Izzo’s promise

The beauty of college basketball is that the zany is still a part of the game. Take Michigan State coach Tom Izzo.

Izzo promised the students that if the Spartans won the outright conference title, he would shave his head after the NCAA tournament.

Get the shearers out.

When the Spartans won at Indiana, 64-59 on March 3, it became a fact. While Izzo isn’t real happy about the consequences, he’ll take the rewards. The Spartans won their first conference title in 10 years and their fifth under Izzo.

Plus, they are pretty well locked into a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament. It makes the March 8 finale against Purdue irrelevant.

Michigan State’s title marked the seventh consecutive year that the conference delivered a solo champ. Wisconsin won in 2003. Illinois won the titles in 2004 and 2005, Ohio State did it in 2006 and 2007 and Wisconsin won again in 2008.

Illinois’ Free Throw Woes

The Fighting Illini are shooting 70.9 percent from the free throw line this year, but the Illini are having trouble getting to the line. They have attempted the fewest free throws in the conference at 388.

The ironic thing is that Illinois leads the Big Ten assists at 17.77 per game.

Briefly…

Penn State, which picked up a huge 64-63 win against Illinois to improve its NCAA tournament, reached the 20-win plateau for the first time since the 2000-01 team, the last team to make the tournament….Minnesota probably will solidify a berth to the tournament if it beats Michigan on Saturday at The Barn. For Gophers coach Tubby Smith, he has recorded 17 consecutive 20-win seasons, the longest active streak in college basketball…if Michigan doesn’t win, the Wolverines are probably in a win-the-tournament-or-else mode.

Power Rankings

1. Michigan St.
2. Illinois
3. Purdue
4. Penn State
5. Minnesota
6. Ohio State
7. Wisconsin
8. Michigan
9. Northwestern
10. Iowa
11. Indiana

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