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Big Ten fails to land a single team in committee's in-season top 16
College basketball’s first-ever Selection Saturday wasn’t kind to the Big Ten.
The NCAA tournament selection committee sent a clear message that it’s not impressed with the league by not including a single one of its teams in its top 16.
The most prominent snub was Big Ten leader Wisconsin, which is 21-3 overall and ranked seventh in the latest AP poll. The committee likely deemed the Badgers unworthy of a spot on the top four seed lines because they lack the marquee wins that other top teams have.
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Not a single team Wisconsin has beaten received votes in either the AP or Coaches poll this week. The Badgers have no inexcusable losses, but the best teams they’ve beaten are Indiana, Marquette, Syracuse and Tennessee, none of whom are a lock to make the NCAA tournament yet.
The Big Ten’s exclusion was the biggest talking point to emerge from a bracket reveal that otherwise featured few surprises.
Reigning national champion Villanova received the No. 1 overall seed in the field with Kansas, Baylor and Gonzaga joining them on the top seed line. The undefeated Zags receiving the last No. 1 seed suggests they could be vulnerable were they to suffer a loss, but committee chair Mark Hollis described the four No. 1 seeds as “very solid.”
“The separation is great,” Hollis said. “The ones are clearly the ones, and there was nobody really that was going to jump up there.”
The ACC dominated the rest of the top 16, landing North Carolina, Louisville and Florida State as No. 2s, Virginia as a No. 3 and Duke as a No. 4. Oregon received the best treatment of any of the Pac-12’s three contenders, landing the No. 2 seed in the West. Arizona was the highest-rated No. 3 seed, while UCLA was shipped to the East Region as a No. 4.
Florida and Kentucky nabbed the remaining No. 3 seeds. Butler and West Virginia earned the other two No. 4s.
Creighton, Wisconsin, Cincinnati and Purdue were the four teams Hollis mentioned when asked who narrowly missed the top 16.
The purpose of releasing an in-season sneak peak at the bracket was to get basketball fans buzzing about March Madness in mid-February.
When NCAA officials recognized the massive interest and TV ratings generated by the college football playoff committee’s weekly rankings, they borrowed the idea for basketball but tweaked the format. The one-time-only reveal is meant to foster transparency and drum up interest in the sport without spoiling the excitement and surprise of Selection Sunday.
The problem with the timing of the exercise is that it renders Saturday’s snapshot somewhat meaningless. College basketball’s landscape can change dramatically with a month worth of games left to play before Selection Sunday.
At this time last year, Iowa was cruising toward a No. 1 seed and Wisconsin was in jeopardy of missing the field altogether. Both ultimately wound up as No. 7 seeds, the product of a typical late-season fade from the Hawkeyes and a sensational finish from the Badgers.
Big Ten teams would love to see some reshuffling this year, but it won’t be easy for the league to dramatically improve its position. First-place Wisconsin and second-place Purdue don’t play each other again during the regular season. Third-place Maryland is also done with the Boilermakers, but they do visit the Badgers on Feb. 19.
That doesn’t leave the league’s top teams many chances to change the selection committee’s perception. One month before Selection Sunday, the Big Ten’s path to a favorable NCAA tournament draw looks bleak.
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
