Ohio State takes over the #1 position in both national college basketball polls. Just like they did in college football a couple months ago…then they lost their very next game at Wisconsin. In hoops, they don’t visit Madison until February 12th, so maybe they’ll be alright for awhile this time.
After the Buckeyes, the talent level drops off DRAMATICALLY! as 2-6 are about as interchangeable as can be. And 7 and 8 are right in there too.
You’ve heard of the expression “for argument sake,” well you can arguably put the big mass of teams in the muddled middle in various spots.
By Paul M. Banks
1. Ohio State Buckeyes (18-0, 5-0) Jared Sullinger has to be the leading front-runner for the Chicago Tribune Silver basketball award. He has won the Big Ten freshman of the year award already; sometime back in October. OSU is currently number four in the nation in field goal percentage, second in fewest fouls, fifth in assist to turnover ratio.
2. Purdue Boilermakers (15-3, 4-1) Losing at West Virginia is not as acceptable as it seems. Although they were a final four team last year, and our receiving votes in the polls this week, the Mountaineers almost lost at DePaul. Seriously DePaul. And I do love random inter-conference games (between teams from power six conferences) in the middle of January and February though! Such an underrated part of life.
3. Michigan State Spartans (12-5, 4-1) I have to put these guys here based on reputation. Very blah the first part of the season; but they’ll inevitably get it going in February and March. And there’s actually a method to this madness. Izzo’s line-up shuffling tells the story (read here for an explanation). Former Michigan “Mr. Basketball,” freshman Keith Appling had a career high 19 in the OT win over NU.
4. (tie) Wisconsin Badgers (13-4, 3-2) Jordan Taylor and Jon Leuer are developing into NBA Talents. And Keaton Nankivil is their third option. Like Illini Coach Bruce Weber said, “no doubt, you got Taylor and Leuer your two main guys, but Nankivil is a great spot shooter, knows the system. He’s older, knows how to play of Leuer and Taylor and the system to get open shots, and if he’s open, he was 13-20 from three in the Big Ten going in and once you got a big guy doing that it really spreads your defense.” Nankivil finished 3-8 from three, 14 pts, 7 rebounds in the win over the Illini.
4. (tie) Illinois Fighting Illini (13-5, 3-2) They handled Wisco the first time at home, so what went wrong Saturday? Bruce Weber said it best: “Second half, you know what they’re going to do, but you have to execute your defense because they just probe you probe you probe you and I thought we made some bad decisions on rotations, let Nankivil open, got into Leuer, they went inside-outside.” And I hate to say this yet again, but to quote Big Ten Network’s Shon Morris after the UIC fiasco, “Mike Davis had one rebound. That’s one more than a dead guy.” Sadly it was true in Madison as well.
6. Minnesota Golden Gophers (14-4, 3-3)- Can’t believe they didn’t sit Trevor Mbakwe, big ten leading rebounder or not, discipline is needed.
7. Penn State Nittany Lions (10-7, 3-3)- You’ll notice I can’t refer to them as the Penn State Talor Battles anymore. They do have some decent second and third pieces; but they still have the most bush league fans in all of college basketball; all 13 of them. PSU’s strength of schedule is top ten and RPI top 60 believe it or not! Now if only they hadn’t been so utterly crushed by a mediocre Maryland team and suffered that home loss to maine; they would be on to something.
8. Northwestern Wildcats (11-5, 2-4)- a soul-crushing defeat at the Breslin Center. They need to get at least two or three signature wins fast, otherwise their season is already over. Wins over Michigan and SIU-Edwardsville should be a given; but neither helps RPI and SOS. Need to sweep Wisconsin, at Minnesota next week or the tourney bubble officially bursts before February even gets here.
9. Michigan Wolverines (11-7, 1-4)- After their pathetic excuse for offense in the first 35 minutes at Indiana (a really bad defensive team), they don’t deserve much attention from me in this BTPR.
10. Indiana Hoosiers (10-8, 1-4)- Because of his mood swings, megalomania and the lack of respect he shows in dealing with the media sometimes, it’s REALLY hard to wish for Tom Crean to right this ship. Although you can read a funny mini-tirade of Crean going off on a reporter here.
11. Iowa Hawkeyes (7-10, 0-5)- They looked competitive against Ohio State. That’s got to be a morale victory, right?
Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net , a Midwest webzine. He’s also a regular contributor to the Tribune’s Chicago Now network, Walter Football.com, Yardbarker Network, and Fox Sports.com
You can follow him on Twitter @thesportsbank
He also does a regular guest spot each week for Chicagoland Sports Radio.com