MBB @ Wisconsin
- Thread starter bdgan
- Start date
People who think it was a poorly coached game don’t know enough about basketball. It’s evident every game that we have a much better Ex’s & Oh’s coach than the previous one. Every time he drew up a play out of a time out, they got a wide-open lock. At some point the kids just have to make the shots or get the rebound or get a stop.
It’s tough to win on the road in the Big Ten. No matter who you’re playing. Combine that with having your second best player get in foul trouble and have your freshman. Post player lay an egg. An average coach with this roster in the same game doesn’t come anywhere close to having a chance to win on the last possession.
It’s tough to win on the road in the Big Ten. No matter who you’re playing. Combine that with having your second best player get in foul trouble and have your freshman. Post player lay an egg. An average coach with this roster in the same game doesn’t come anywhere close to having a chance to win on the last possession.
No question....I think it's clearly visible the upgrade in the Xs and Os as u mentioned with Micah. Previously, I don't remember ever thinking Pat drew up anything worthwhile.
Don’t look now, but the Huskers just beat OSU, albeit at home. The only caveat is that OSU now has lost five games in a row.
Yeah, we are not even in these games with Chambers and previous administrations. Coach Shrew is the best coach we have had.
I’m as big of a Shrewsberry fan as anyone, but…I don’t even know what “these games” is supposed to mean. We beat plenty of teams better than this year’s Wisconsin team under former coaches and administrations. Two of Pat’s final three teams were very likely better than we are this year.
Last time Pat took a team to the Kohl center was 2019 and we were up by 7 at halftime, down by 1 with a minute left, and lost by 4. Sounds relatively familiar (and that Wisconsin team was significantly better than this one).
At the start of this week, I believe that there only was one Big 10 team ranked. The Big 10 is very down this year. Right now, I think that only Purdue and Illinois and maybe Rutgers are assured of going to the tournament, although probably a few others eventually will make it just for TV and attendance reasons.
TV and attendance have nothing to do with NCAA selection…the Big Ten will have a large number of teams in the tournament because a large number of teams will deserve to be in the tournament. While the top may not be overly strong, there is a lot of depth this year.
So you really believe that a mid-major school with slightly better credentials would be selected over a mega-Big 10 school with mediocre credentials that has a huge alumni base and a lot of fans who never even went to the school, and that TV and attendance play no role in that decision? IMO, that's very naive, especially since recently there are a lot of empty seats at many of these venues for the first and second round games. That's why there probably will be six or seven Big 10 schools selected to tournament, because it certainly isn't going to have a lot to do with how good they are, because this is the worst collection of Big 10 basketball teams from top to bottom that I've seen in a long time.
Year after year, the committee passes over teams that have big alumni bases or lots of fans for smaller schools. The NCAA hasn't had to worry about selling ads or selling tickets in the past, and they won't worry about it this year.
The Big Ten is currently the second best conference in the country by pretty much any metric that you can look at. Based on quality of resumes, we'd likely get 9ish teams into the tournament if it started today.
Based on what I've seen this year, I think that the SEC, Big 12 and Pac 12 all are better this season than the Big 10, and the ACC probably is too, regardless of what metrics you use.
Also, I'd be shocked if the Big 10 gets nine teams in this season; it's a struggle for any conference to get nine into the tournament even when it's really good which the Big 10 isn't this year. That would mean that teams like OSU and Maryland make it, and their trajectories are going way down since the start of the season. Right now, I would have Purdue, Illinois and Rutgers as in, and probably MSU, with IU likely. Wisconsin and maybe Iowa probably will do enough in the end to get selected. Northwestern probably won't do enough to get selected, and I don't think that Michigan, OSU or Maryland will have the credentials in the end to be considered.
I still stand by my opinion that when in doubt, the Committee will select a Big 10 school with less credentials over a smaller school with better credentials, so maybe the Big 10 will get nine teams in this season even if it would be undeserved.
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The B10 will get a good amount of teams in the dance. 9 sounds high but likely candidates are Wisky, Purdue, MSU, Mich, Rutgers, Illinois, Iowa. Also, MD, PSU and Indiana are possibilities.
Maybe this Wisky team is worse than the 2019 version, I don't know. I do know this current Wisky team is no pushover and certainly not at home. PSU took it to the last possession. Not a bad loss. It feels like Shrews has this program rising and we are ready to breakthrough. The team plays tough. We will see this season and into next season.
That’s why prior to last night, WVU was 10-7 overall and 0-5 in conference and projected as a #9 seed….not sure what “credentials” put them in the tournament with that record. Name recognition plays a huge role in who gets selected.
You need to look around college basketball at the landscape though...the committee is going to have to come up with 36 at-large teams, and there are a lot of conferences that have fewer good candidates than in a "typical" year. If you're picking it today, you're likely going to have between 8 and 10 Big Ten teams in it. A team like Iowa is about an 8 seed today, not on the outside looking in.
And it has nothing at all to do with the size of a school or it's fanbase...it's a myth that people perpetuate year after year that has no basis in the historical reality. Look at the last 5 years...the biggest surprises to be left out were Texas A&M, Louisville, TCU, and USC. Teams that were surprising inclusions were Rutgers/Wyoming/ND (most had one of those three out and TA&M in, but not much consensus on which one), Wichita State, Belmont, and Syracuse. The committee doesn't care what conference you're from, or how many make it from your conference. They care about who you played, where you played them, and the results.
Definitely no pushover (very few are in this league right now), but that 2019 team was the Ethan Happ squad that went 14-6 in the B1G and ended up as a 5 seed in the NCAAs. Wisconsin will likely hang around the bubble most of the year...their road win at Marquette looks better every day, and non-conf wins over Dayton and USC will help a lot. It will be a grind for them, as they don't score enough to chalk up many games as easy "W's", but their D is good enough to them hang around most nights.
