No gimmee games in the B10

[IUNorth]

Wisconsin might be the best team in the conference, and Kohl's is certainly one of the more difficult venues. And Minnesota, the consensus worst team in the conference, had a great chance to beat them at the end last night. I was all set to make a post about how I hate watching Wisconsin play, but I admire how they always finish teams at the end. They won last night, but they certainly didn't finish Minny off like they normally do. Turnovers, missed free throws, blown defensive assignments...they're not immune to those things too, evidently.

Michigan State is perennially one of the best teams in our conference. Northwestern is regarded as one of the bottom few teams this year like usual, and they beat MSU in East Lansing.

I don't know the point of this post, other than to remind myself, and others, that when IU loses games going forward to teams like Minny/NW, etc... It isn't the end of the world.

We need to win "most" of the winnable games, and steal an unlikely one or two. We should win 8,9, even all 10 conference games at home. We need to be trending up in late February into March. Anything more than 11-12 conference wins this year should be seen as pretty significant improvement.

I'm sure I'll be on here venting after losses anyways though... Actually I know I will be if we lose for similar reasons to what we have the last year and a half, or if the losses continue to be effort/toughness based like Kansas and Rutgers were. But having a little perspective that the gap between the best and worst teams in the B10 isn't nearly as wide as it used to be...might help a little.

 

[Courtsensetwo]

Road games will be brutal all season. Iowa is a desperate wounded animal now playing for their struggling team mate.

Bad news for us.

 

[Coach Geez]

Wisconsin might be the best team in the conference, and Kohl's is certainly one of the more difficult venues. And Minnesota, the consensus worst team in the conference, had a great chance to beat them at the end last night. I was all set to make a post about how I hate watching Wisconsin play, but I admire how they always finish teams at the end. They won last night, but they certainly didn't finish Minny off like they normally do. Turnovers, missed free throws, blown defensive assignments...they're not immune to those things too, evidently.

Michigan State is perennially one of the best teams in our conference. Northwestern is regarded as one of the bottom few teams this year like usual, and they beat MSU in East Lansing.

I don't know the point of this post, other than to remind myself, and others, that when IU loses games going forward to teams like Minny/NW, etc... It isn't the end of the world.

We need to win "most" of the winnable games, and steal an unlikely one or two. We should win 8,9, even all 10 conference games at home. We need to be trending up in late February into March. Anything more than 11-12 conference wins this year should be seen as pretty significant improvement.

I'm sure I'll be on here venting after losses anyways though... Actually I know I will be if we lose for similar reasons to what we have the last year and a half, or if the losses continue to be effort/toughness based like Kansas and Rutgers were. But having a little perspective that the gap between the best and worst teams in the B10 isn't nearly as wide as it used to be...might help a little.

Tyler Wahl rolled his ankle about 10 minutes into the game and didn't return. He's about as invaluable as it gets to this Badger team. And while Wisconsin always has the ability to keep it close with they way they muck it up, there's not another player like him on this years team. They will miss him dearly if he's out for any kind of extended time.

 

[IUNorth]

Tyler Wahl rolled his ankle about 10 minutes into the game and didn't return. He's about as invaluable as it gets to this Badger team. And while Wisconsin always has the ability to keep it close with they way they muck it up, there's not another player like him in this years team. They will miss him dearly if he's out for any kind of extended time.

For sure. He wasn't having a great game before the injury, but him missing the whole 2nd half obviously played a factor in them not closing them out better.

Longer term, assuming its not a bad ankle sprain that lingers the whole year, it could end up helping them. Crowley is starting to emerge...if he continues on his current path, and then Wahl can come back fully healthy at some point...that makes Wisconsin the best team in the conference in my opinion. They might have the best PG in the conference. Wahl and an emerging Crowley would be one of the best frontcourts. And then they have really, really solid complimentary wings that can make shots and defend.

Sounds like a typical Wisconsin team. Good PG, Good bigs, bunch of solid wings.

 

[Coach Geez]

For sure. He wasn't having a great game before the injury, but him missing the whole 2nd half obviously played a factor in them not closing them out better.

Longer term, assuming its not a bad ankle sprain that lingers the whole year, it could end up helping them. Crowley is starting to emerge...if he continues on his current path, and then Wahl can come back fully healthy at some point...that makes Wisconsin the best team in the conference in my opinion. They might have the best PG in the conference. Wahl and an emerging Crowley would be one of the best frontcourts. And then they have really, really solid complimentary wings that can make shots and defend.

Sounds like a typical Wisconsin team. Good PG, Good bigs, bunch of solid wings.

Ohio State in my opinion is the most complete team. Best offense and defense is improving rapidly. Wisconsin with their ability to close out games is always going to make them a threat. Michigan could be really good once their young guys learn that they need to play defense at this level. Rutgers has impressed as well. But overall, B10 seems pretty underwhelming in the grand scheme of things. Purdue was the consensus #1 team in the country coming into the week but to me has looked like a fringe top 25 the better part of the last month playing inferior competition. Very real chance they lose all 3 games this week.

There is a lot of parity though in this league and I expect it to be a dogfight throughout. Hold serve at home and steal one or two on the road and you may find yourselves B10 champs. I wouldn't count Indiana out just yet.

 

[.Gerdis]

Wisconsin is a program I have a lot of respect for. You just can never write them off. Losing Davis will hurt their ability to close games, but it’s crazy how consistent they are as a program.

 

[IUNorth]

Ohio State in my opinion is the most complete team. Best offense and defense is improving rapidly. Wisconsin with their ability to close out games is always going to make them a threat. Michigan could be really good once their young guys learn that they need to play defense at this level. Rutgers has impressed as well. But overall, B10 seems pretty underwhelming in the grand scheme of things. Purdue was the consensus #1 team in the country coming into the week but to me has looked like a fringe top 25 the better part of the last month playing inferior competition. Very real chance they lose all 3 games this week.

There is a lot of parity though in this league and I expect it to be a dogfight throughout. Hold serve at home and steal one or two on the road and you may find yourselves B10 champs. I wouldn't count Indiana out just yet.

OSU is good. They should have lost to Rutgers at home though...RU got jobbed big time at the end. Inexplicably so, I'd say. Obviously reviewable stuff that never got reviewed. But OSU is relatively young, and getting better, for sure. And Holtman is a solid coach.

There are probably 8-9 teams that I could see winning a close regular season race, including IU. Teams schedules might come into play this year, as much as any other year. Who has the weakest schedule? Wisconsin again?

 

[mushroomgod_1]

Wisconsin might be the best team in the conference, and Kohl's is certainly one of the more difficult venues. And Minnesota, the consensus worst team in the conference, had a great chance to beat them at the end last night. I was all set to make a post about how I hate watching Wisconsin play, but I admire how they always finish teams at the end. They won last night, but they certainly didn't finish Minny off like they normally do. Turnovers, missed free throws, blown defensive assignments...they're not immune to those things too, evidently.

Michigan State is perennially one of the best teams in our conference. Northwestern is regarded as one of the bottom few teams this year like usual, and they beat MSU in East Lansing.

I don't know the point of this post, other than to remind myself, and others, that when IU loses games going forward to teams like Minny/NW, etc... It isn't the end of the world.

We need to win "most" of the winnable games, and steal an unlikely one or two. We should win 8,9, even all 10 conference games at home. We need to be trending up in late February into March. Anything more than 11-12 conference wins this year should be seen as pretty significant improvement.

I'm sure I'll be on here venting after losses anyways though... Actually I know I will be if we lose for similar reasons to what we have the last year and a half, or if the losses continue to be effort/toughness based like Kansas and Rutgers were. But having a little perspective that the gap between the best and worst teams in the B10 isn't nearly as wide as it used to be...might help a little.

While amazed at what Wisconsin continues to do. I don't see them as being at quite the same level as in past years.

I see Crawl as something of a poor man's version of a combo Kaminsky/Happ/Reuvers/Potter type. He's not the dominating influence of the former 2, and doesn't shoot the 3 as well as the later two.

Wahl's a very nice and crafty poor man's version of Sam Dekker. While he's very versatile, he's only shooting 21% on 3s this year.

Hepburn's a fine player, but he's not as good as Johnny Davis was, and he has to be kind of a Davis/Davidson combo for them this year. He is shooting over 50% presently on 3s, which is impressive.

They're getting a lot from Esseglan, who's hitting 44% on 3s....he's a good role player.

I don't think they have the depth and inside presence of past great Wisconsin teams. Right now Crawl & Wahl are their leading rebounders at about 6.5 each.

I think Purdue is better than what they've shown lately. I'm really surprised at how little they're getting from their non-freshman role players. And I continue to believe IU has the physical talent to be much better than what they've shown recently. If IU and/or Purdue can't get it together, Wisconsin can win by default.

 

[mushroomgod_1]

While amazed at what Wisconsin continues to do. I don't see them as being at quite the same level as in past years.

I see Crawl as something of a poor man's version of a combo Kaminsky/Happ/Reuvers/Potter type. He's not the dominating influence of the former 2, and doesn't shoot the 3 as well as the later two.

Wahl's a very nice and crafty poor man's version of Sam Dekker. While he's very versatile, he's only shooting 21% on 3s this year.

Hepburn's a fine player, but he's not as good as Johnny Davis was, and he has to be kind of a Davis/Davidson combo for them this year. He is shooting over 50% presently on 3s, which is impressive.

They're getting a lot from Esseglan, who's hitting 44% on 3s....he's a good role player.

I don't think they have the depth and inside presence of past great Wisconsin teams. Right now Crawl & Wahl are their leading rebounders at about 6.5 each.

I think Purdue is better than what they've shown lately. I'm really surprised at how little they're getting from their non-freshman role players. And I continue to believe IU has the physical talent to be much better than what they've shown recently. If IU and/or Purdue can't get it together, Wisconsin can win by default.

To go along with the theme of this post, I looked at current BT stats.....Wahl is their leading scorer at 13.2/game, which ranks 21st in the BT. Crawl is their leading rebounder at 6.5, which is 17th. Crawl is their leader is assists at 3.2, which is 17th.

They're doing it with smoke and mirrors. I hope this IU team wakes up and starts playing to its potential. I can't stand the thought of Wisconsin winning another BT title.

 

[IUNorth]

To go along with the theme of this post, I looked at current BT stats.....Wahl is their leading scorer at 13.2/game, which ranks 21st in the BT. Crawl is their leading rebounder at 6.5, which is 17th. Crawl is their leader is assists at 3.2, which is 17th.

They're doing it with smoke and mirrors. I hope this IU team wakes up and starts playing to its potential. I can't stand the thought of Wisconsin winning another BT title.

Not sure its smoke and mirrors. But I get your point.

I think Hepburn is one of, if not the best PG in the conference though. And I give Wahl and Crowl a little more credit. Together they're one of the better front courts in the conference. Not as visibly physically imposing as say IU, Purdue, and Michigan frontcourts are. But in terms of efficiency, the ability to compete, rebound, score, defend...they're just as solid as any of them.

I think their stable of wing players is likely where they're a little deficient. They're solid, and many of them are hitting open shots well, but that's where they aren't "B10 title good", or "Final Four contender" good.

Wisconsin's overall program takes on an element of smoke and mirrors, every year. I think with Hepburn, Wahl, and Crowl, outside the Kaminsky Dekker teams...this core group of leaders are as good as they've had.

 

[TyWebbIU]

Road games will be brutal all season. Iowa is a desperate wounded animal now playing for their struggling team mate.

Bad news for us.

IU should handily beat Iowa. Iowa is NOT good.

It is bad news for IU if they lose that game.

 

[TyWebbIU]

Ohio State in my opinion is the most complete team. Best offense and defense is improving rapidly. Wisconsin with their ability to close out games is always going to make them a threat. Michigan could be really good once their young guys learn that they need to play defense at this level. Rutgers has impressed as well. But overall, B10 seems pretty underwhelming in the grand scheme of things. Purdue was the consensus #1 team in the country coming into the week but to me has looked like a fringe top 25 the better part of the last month playing inferior competition. Very real chance they lose all 3 games this week.

There is a lot of parity though in this league and I expect it to be a dogfight throughout. Hold serve at home and steal one or two on the road and you may find yourselves B10 champs. I wouldn't count Indiana out just yet.

Rutgers is good. They play hard. MCConnell is the best defender in the league. Watch him defensively some game. He’s unbelievably good.

I’ll be extremely surprised if Purdue loses all 3 this week. Though Smith for Purdue did look very overmatched vs. Rutgers, much of that could be McConnell’s defense though.

 

[Coach Geez]

I’ll be extremely surprised if Purdue loses all 3 this week. Though Smith for Purdue did look very overmatched vs. Rutgers, much of that could be McConnell’s defense though

They'll be underdogs to Ohio State and small favorites against Penn State. Neither team has an answer for Edey but not sure Purdue has the firepower to outscore either. OSU is one of the most efficient offenses in the country and PSU can absolutely light it up from downtown, they'll gladly trade 2's for 3's in this matchup.

 

[IU FAN IN W. NC]

To go along with the theme of this post, I looked at current BT stats.....Wahl is their leading scorer at 13.2/game, which ranks 21st in the BT. Crawl is their leading rebounder at 6.5, which is 17th. Crawl is their leader is assists at 3.2, which is 17th.

They're doing it with smoke and mirrors. I hope this IU team wakes up and starts playing to its potential. I can't stand the thought of Wisconsin winning another BT title.

I'm not one to go looking up stats, but did you look at where they stand on low turnovers and defensive rebounding? In years past they tend to not pound the offensive boards but instead hustle back to play Defense. Just wondering

 

[RUtrumpet92]

I'm not one to go looking up stats, but did you look at where they stand on low turnovers and defensive rebounding? In years past they tend to not pound the offensive boards but instead hustle back to play Defense. Just wondering

Wisconsin is dead last in the league in rebounding margin at -2.6 per game, 13th in offensive rebounding at 7.5 per game (PSU is 6.1), and last in defensive rebounds at 25.2 per game (Minnesota is 25.5). Some of that is because they are playing their usual slow, slow tempo game ( 336 in possessions per game at 64).

Editing to add turnover info: they have a +3.7 turnover margin, only committing 9.7 per game. So that's a typical Wisconsin team, too.

I do think their ranking is inflated to this point. Their overall FG% as a team is only 43.1%, 12th in the league. Sure, they are 3-0 in conference play, against Minnesota (worst in the league), at Iowa (weaker than usual and no Murray that game, and still only a three point win), and Maryland. They have a big schedule break of only facing Michigan State, Rutgers and Purdue once each, all at home so they avoid the best home-court advantages in the conference, and Ohio State once, on the road. Their other one-off road games are Indiana and Nebraska.

Good luck tomorrow, that's a tough one to predict with the unknown of how Iowa will respond in the first game without Pat McCaffery.

 

[Harry Hondo]

Wisconsin is dead last in the league in rebounding margin at -2.6 per game, 13th in offensive rebounding at 7.5 per game (PSU is 6.1), and last in defensive rebounds at 25.2 per game (Minnesota is 25.5). Some of that is because they are playing their usual slow, slow tempo game ( 336 in possessions per game at 64).

Editing to add turnover info: they have a +3.7 turnover margin, only committing 9.7 per game. So that's a typical Wisconsin team, too.

I do think their ranking is inflated to this point. Their overall FG% as a team is only 43.1%, 12th in the league. Sure, they are 3-0 in conference play, against Minnesota (worst in the league), at Iowa (weaker than usual and no Murray that game, and still only a three point win), and Maryland. They have a big schedule break of only facing Michigan State, Rutgers and Purdue once each, all at home so they avoid the best home-court advantages in the conference, and Ohio State once, on the road. Their other one-off road games are Indiana and Nebraska.

Good luck tomorrow, that's a tough one to predict with the unknown of how Iowa will respond in the first game without Pat McCaffery.

And McCaffery in the past has always played well against IU. But it always seems that they’ll find someone who uncharacteristically has a great game and hits everything he puts up. Last year in Iowa City Keegan Murray was the worry but it was his brother Kris who had a career game and scored around 30, if I recall. And then there was Bohanon in every game he played IU. Feel bad that McCaffery is having mental issues, but I’m kinda relieved he won’t be playing Thursday.