Coming off of the high of putting three teams into the Elite Eight and one of those into the Final Four a year ago, the Big Ten slipped back to the pack in terms of conference superiority this season. Despite winning the ACC/Big Ten Challenge and advancing two more teams to the sport’s final weekend, the Big 12 and the Big East put together better regular seasons by most reasonable metrics. The question coming out of this season is whether the 2014-15 campaign actually was a disappointment or did Wisconsin and Michigan State’s runs to the Final Four erase the league’s previous sins?

Did the NCAA Tournament runs by Wisconsin and Michigan State make up for the Big Ten’s non-conference performance?

• Reasons for Disappointment: The league took a hit in terms of its early credibility with some really bad non-conference losses. Some of those opponents — like Eastern Washington and Texas Southern — eventually went on to make the NCAA Tournament, but a 136-44 record with 16 losses to non-power conference foes led to the writing of the league’s epitaph before conference play had even started. Michigan State, Michigan and Nebraska weren’t Top 25 teams for very long after rough starts. Ohio State, Iowa and Indiana blew multiple chances for marquee wins. And while the addition of Maryland made the league stronger at the top, Rutgers’ 8-5 non-conference record was fool’s gold on its way to a 2-16 Big Ten campaign. It’s an open question whether Illinois and Minnesota underachieved with experienced lineups that were unable to notch NCAA Tournament berths this season.

• The Positives: All in all, this Big Ten season actually wasn’t all that different from last year’s campaign, as the conference’s strong (12-7) performance in the NCAA Tournament righted some of its earlier wrongs. Maryland unexpectedly emerged as the second best team in the league, and Purdue shook off an 8-5 non-conference start to make a return to postseason play. Iowa came on strong late in the season and won its first NCAA Tournament game under Fran McCaffery. Lastly, Michigan State turned a #7 seed into yet another Final Four appearance for Tom Izzo. Even after a disappointing loss in the national title game, Wisconsin showed its mettle as an elite team throughout a special season marked by having the most efficient offense in the country.
• The Verdict: Any time a league puts seven teams into the NCAAs and fills out half of the Final Four, it’s tough to call the season a disappointment. But a big-picture assessment of the league as a whole isn’t quite so rosy. Too many Big Ten teams exited this season with bitter tastes in their mouths to argue that the league had an excellent year. Things are looking up, though. Maryland, Indiana, Michigan State, Michigan, Purdue and Wisconsin all have reasonable claims to a spot in next year’s preseason Top 25. Ohio State will be loaded with young talent. Iowa and Illinois have some key pieces coming back. With a top half that can stand up to any other league’s best eight or nine teams, look for the Big Ten to catapult back into the discussion as the best conference in college basketball next year.

Brendan Brody (307 Posts)

Brendan Brody is in his fourth season covering the Big Ten for RTC. Email him at brendan.brody@gmail.com, or follow him on twitter @berndon4.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 14th, 2015 at 9:01 am by Brendan Brody and is filed under big ten, microsites. Tagged: illinois, indiana, iowa, maryland, michigan, michigan state, minnesota, nebraska, ohio state, purdue, rutgers, wisconsin. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.