1. Saturday’s loss to Michigan State was certainly a tough one to swallow for Ohio State, which passed up a prime opportunity to create some distance in the Big Ten standings and move their home winning streak to 40 games. But the Buckeyes were dismal on offense, and the Spartans controlled the game nearly throughout. And, says All-American center Jared Sullinger, it was easy to tell the Buckeyes were frustrated. After further review, Sullinger said he and his teammates acted like “spoiled brats” during the game, complaining about calls and arguing with one another. It was clear the Spartans succeeded in taking Ohio State out of its game plan, but the Buckeyes have a chance back on track this week with critical games at Minnesota and Michigan.
2. Speaking of the Wolverines, they have quietly kept themselves right in the thick of this conference race, and have every reason to be considered a contender for their first conference title since 1986. Michigan is half a game behind Ohio State and Michigan State, but has a game remaining against the Buckeyes (the Wolverines split their season series against the Spartans) and, among those three teams, Michigan has arguably the easiest road the rest of the way. The Maize and Blue will host ESPN’s College GameDay on Saturday in its only game this week.
3. Iowa coach Fran McCaffery probably doesn’t get a chance to autograph too many items bearing Michigan State insignia, but he’s made an exception. The chair that McCaffery so famously slammed on the Breslin Center floor during the Spartans’ 95-61 blowout win against the Hawkeyes earlier this year was signed and auctioned off at a recent Iowa baseball fundraiser. The message McCaffery wrote? “Coach with passion!” Sounds about right.
4. The quiet grumbling concerning Bruce Weber‘s job security are starting to evolve into a hearty growl in Champaign, where Illinois has lost six of its last seven games, placing its head coach firmly on the hot seat. This chatter has been going on for some time, but Weber may be running out of time, writes The News Gazette’s Loren Tate. Athletic director Mike Thomas said he will “filter out the emotion”  when making an end-of-the-season evaluation about Weber, the same treatment football coach Ron Zook received. Will Weber suffer the same fate?
5. Every coach has his buzz words, and one of Tom Crean‘s favorites is “deflections.” If you listen to the Indiana coach’s postgame remarks or follow him on Twitter, he often preaches how important deflections are to his team’s performance. And now his players are starting to speak his language. According to the Indianapolis Star‘s Terry Hutchens, Crean jumped on the deflections bandwagon when he was an assistant at Western Kentucky under Ralph Willard in the early 1990s. A deflection — Victor Oladipo is the team leader with 220 — is considered a steal, blocked shot, tip, or a charge.

It was a Big Ten clash of the titans, filled with big storylines and consequence, and it proved to be a telling game. Michigan State positioned itself as a legitimate threat to Ohio State‘s hopes for winning the conference title, which were once perceived to be all but a sure thing before the Spartans’ 58-48 upset win in Columbus. Here are a few things to take away from Saturday evening’s game:

Jared Sullinger and Draymond Green are in a two-horse race for Big Ten Player of the Year. (Terry Gilliam/AP)

1. Implications For the Big Ten Race — At the beginning of the year, Ohio State was deemed the clear-cut favorite to take home the conference hardware and, despite a shaky start to Big Ten play, the Buckeyes had really started to emerge as the favorite. But Michigan State has been far more competitive this year than many expected and is now right in the thick of it. It’s easy to envision this conference race coming down to the wire, when Ohio State travels to East Lansing for Michigan State’s Senior Day on March 4. But for now, with the two clubs tied atop the conference standings (one game ahead of Wisconsin and Michigan), they’ve each got to protect the throne. Things get no easier for the Spartans, who now host Wisconsin before traveling to Purdue and Minnesota. The Buckeyes also have two road games coming up, going to Michigan and at home versus Minnesota. Both scenarios leave plenty of room for the Wolverines and Badgers to creep back into the mix, so things remain as up for grabs as ever. Read the rest of this entry »

We are starting to see things shake themselves out in the Big Ten standings, but all it takes is one full slate of games to change that in a flash. There’s a nice lineup on Thursday night, so let’s take a look at the implications of three games around the conference.

#23 Wisconsin at Minnesota, 7 PM ET

• It has certainly been a topsy-turvy season of sorts for the Badgers, who have been uncharacteristically mediocre at home, but made up for it with staunch play on the road. This is another test for Wisconsin as it tries to keep pace atop the standings and a critical game for Minnesota’s NCAA Tournament chances. The Golden Gophers are on the bubble with a tough road ahead so they need to capitalize on all reasonable home opportunities with a return date set in Madison for February 28. The Badgers can put the conference’s top scoring defense to the test, while Minnesota — shooting 36% this season, third in the conference, from 3-point range — will try to knock the Badgers down from deep. This game comes down to how well Minnesota, 10th in the Big Ten in turnover margin, protects the ball at home against a stingy Badgers defense.

Illinois at #22 Indiana, 8 PM ET

• These teams are neck-and-neck in the standings, 3 1/2 games behind first-place Ohio State, but Illinois needs this one just a bit more than Indiana. That said, with the way the Hoosiers have performed at home versus Illinois’ inconsistent play, it will be a tall order for Bruce Weber‘s group. It’s the lone meeting of the year between these two groups, and the Fighting Illini are sure to need another heroic effort out of Brandon Paul (he has scored in double figures in each of his Big Ten games) to keep up with Indiana’s high-flying offense. A loss Thursday and the Hoosiers just may switch places with the Illini in terms of NCAA Tournament chances.

Illinois is going to need a big effort out of Brandon Paul at Indiana. (Joe Robbins/Getty)

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Ah, life on the bubble. One day things look good, and the next they look bleak. Today, things are looking up for Northwestern as Bill Carmody tries to lead the Wildcats to their first-ever NCAA Tournament berth. But how long can things look rosy, and how much wiggle room to they have? Potentially not long. And not much.

John Shurna has a great chance to lead Northwestern to its first-ever NCAA Tournament. (Anthony Gruppuso / US Presswire)

To start with, the Wildcats already have the 10th-best strength of schedule in the country, and it should stay in that range through the end of the season. They also have a strong RPI of #37, and are certainly the beneficiaries of a first-rate Big Ten this year (six of the top 10 schools for strength of schedule are from the conference). Also, the Wildcats really don’t have a terrible loss. Every team they’ve lost to — Baylor, Creighton, Ohio State, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Purdue — has a legitimate shot at the NCAA Tournament. Northwestern’s worst defeat is probably a 75-52 loss at Minnesota, one of their three road losses by 20 or more points.

As for their road ahead in order to secure an NCAA Tournament bid, the Wildcats must win three of their last four at home, beating Iowa, Minnesota and Michigan, and losing just to Ohio State. As for road games, they need to beat Penn State and Iowa but can afford losses at Purdue and Indiana. If things go that way, the Wildcats will be 19-11 overall and 9-9 in the conference with wins over Michigan State, Michigan and at Illinois. Best-case scenario, Northwestern could end up 20-12 overall (9-9 Big Ten) with a Big Ten Tournament win to help pad the resume, without a single disastrous loss to an RPI Top 100 team.

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If you were in Michigan on Sunday, the Super Bowl was the other game, as sports fans around the Mitten State had more of an interest in what is heating up to be quite the series between Michigan and Michigan State on the hardwood. In a rematch of Michigan’s one-point win on January 17 in Ann Arbor, the Spartans handled their in-state rivals for a 64-54 win behind an inspired performance from senior captain Draymond Green.

MSU Students Were Tuned In During the Action, At Least (DFP/K. Dozier)

Here are a few things to take away from this important Big Ten showdown:

1. Rebounding — You need look no further than Green’s individual stat line to understand the massive discrepancy in rebounding between these two teams on Sunday. Michigan State pulled down 39 rebounds on the afternoon, while Michigan had just 15. Most impressively, Green had 16 of the Spartans’ boards. Yes, Draymond Green single-handedly outrebounded Michigan on the glass. It was pretty clear that Michigan State, which entered the afternoon leading the conference in rebounding margin (and Green leading the conference in rebounds per game), would probably have an advantage on the glass, but it was unknown how much it would factor into the final result. Also, the offensive rebounding differential (Michigan State 12-3) led to 16 second-chance Michigan State points, while the Wolverines had just three. Read the rest of this entry »

1. In big rivalry games such as Sunday’s Michigan vs. Michigan State showdown in East Lansing, you typically like to see the stars come out to play. But Michigan’s Tim Hardaway, Jr., was nowhere to be found. Michigan State’s defense deserves some of the credit, but this is not the first big game-turned-Michigan-loss where Hardaway’s presence has hardly been felt. Hardaway had a season-low four points on a career-worst 1-for-10 shooting Sunday afternoon. As AnnArbor.com‘s Kyle Meinke points out, Michigan is 2-4 in the six games in which Hardaway has failed to score double figures this season. The problem for the Wolverines and their quest for a Big Ten title is that three of those games have come since January 14 and each of them has resulted in a loss.
2. Keeping with the showdown in East Lansing, so much attention was paid to the left knee of Michigan State senior captain Draymond Green after he apparently injured it in the final minutes of the Spartans’ one-point loss to Illinois this weekend. But as Green seemed fine (he singlehandedly outrebounded Michigan), it was freshman Branden Dawson who continued to shine for the Tom Izzo’s team. Dawson, who had just four points in 12 minutes in his first career game against Michigan earlier this year, stayed hot with an inspired 10 points and four rebounds Sunday. He is now averaging 14.0 points, 6.7 rebounds and 24.7 minutes in the three games since the first game against Michigan.
3. As for the other in-state rivalry game that played out in the Big Ten on Sunday, Illinois coach Bruce Weber was disappointed in his team’s performance at home against rival Northwestern, which took down the Fighting Illini 74-70 at Assembly Hall. “It would be an understatement to say it’s a disappointing loss,” Weber said afterward. It was the defense, in particular, that irked the head coach, who saw his team hold Michigan State to 24.1% shooting just five days earlier. On Sunday, Northwestern shot 60.4% from the field.
4. Purdue coach Matt Painter said this week that he wants a fight, but he may not want this much of a fight. After a home loss to rival Indiana on Saturday night, the Boilermakers face a serious uphill climb in the Big Ten and may soon find themselves on the outside of the NCAA Tournament looking in. Painter said in a teleconference earlier this week that this season has probably been the most trying at Purdue since his first, when the team was 9-19. “I don’t mind the struggle,” Painter said. “I just want a fight. You’re going to have struggle. Just want guys to stay together and fight. You can tell sometimes when we have a bad call go against us, we hang our heads when we go back down the court.” It certainly doesn’t get easier for the Boilermakers, who have have games against Ohio State, Illinois and Michigan State in the next two weeks.
5. He may go on to become one of the all-time leading scorers in Ohio State basketball history, but even William Buford needs a little confidence booster every once in a while. He got that on Saturday with a big three-pointer to key Ohio State’s massive victory at Wisconsin. It hadn’t been Buford’s best afternoon, but the bucket was a big one. “When we need him, he shows up,” Buckeyes center Jared Sullinger said. “That’s one thing about Will: Crunch time, you always want to leave Will out on the floor because he has the (guts) to take a shot like that.” Buford had missed 11 of his 14 shots in the game at that point, and it was Ohio State’s first three-pointer of the game, but helped the Buckeyes clinch their first victory at the Kohl Center in 12 years.

The Ohio State – Wisconsin game Saturday afternoon certainly was as good as advertised and, whether you’re a fan of either school or just good Big Ten basketball, it was a treat to watch. Here are a few things to take away from a contest that had major implications on the conference standings:

Jared Sullinger Dominated the Post in Madison Today ( Jeff Hanisch-US PRESSWIRE)

1. The effect on the standings — With the victory, the Buckeyes are now in the conference driver’s seat. As of the end of this game, Ohio State held a one-game lead in the standings over Michigan, with Michigan State and Wisconsin trailing the Wolverines by half a game. Michigan heads to Michigan State on Sunday and a Wolverines loss would drop them further back, giving Ohio State even more cushion. The Buckeyes still have to host Wisconsin, play Michigan State twice, and go to Ann Arbor, but a win in one of the toughest environments in the Big Ten against the conference’s hottest team secures Ohio State as the top dog in the conference right now. Read the rest of this entry »