The Big Ten Men’s Basketball Tournament gets underway in Indianapolis this Thursday, March 10th with three opening round games.
In the first game the #8 seed Northwestern Wildcats take on the #9 seed Minnesota Golden Gophers. The winners get the honor of playing the top-seeded Ohio State Buckeyes on Friday.
The next opening round game has #7 seed Michigan State Spartans taking on #10 seed Iowa. The winner will take on #2 seed Purdue Boilermakers Friday evening.
The last opening round game Thursday night has #6 seed Penn State Nittany Lions facing off against the last place #11 seed Indiana Hoosiers. The winner takes on #3 seed Wisconsin Badgers in the final game on Friday night.
The quarterfinals begin Friday with the Ohio State Buckeyes and their diaper dandy, freshman Jared Sullinger, who is averaging seventeen points and nine rebounds per game, easily taking care of the Northwestern/Minnesota game winner.
Ohio State will breeze through their opening game and beat either team handily, advancing to the semi-finals.
At 2:30 Friday, #4 seed Michigan Wolverines will take on #5 seed Illinois Fighting Illini in a crucial game for both teams. This has the makings of a great match up with both teams trying to improve their NCAA Tournament resume. Michigan seems to have the upper hand in this game as they have won eight of their last eleven games while the Illini have dropped seven of their last twelve games.
This game will go down to the wire but the Wolverines should pull out the “W” if they carry over their shooting hot streak from the regular season. If Michigan comes out victorious it will setup a semi-final match up against “that team from down south.”
Friday evening will have the #2 seed Purdue facing off against the Iowa/ Michigan State winner. Michigan State should prevail, setting up a tough game for the Boilermakers. Purdue will have to be very efficient on offense against the Spartans, who always seem to be ready in the post-season, despite an off- year.
Purdue should take care of the chemistry-lacking Spartans and move on to the semis.
The nightcap on Friday will have #3 Wisconsin taking on the Penn State/Indiana winner. Even though Indiana may pull off a first round upset, they will run into a red-hot Wisconsin team.
The Badgers should easily take care of either team and get their grudge match against Purdue.
If my predictions are correct, Saturday will start with Ohio State taking on the Wolverines. This will be the hardest fought game of the tournament, with Michigan looking to redeem their buzzer beater loss that knocked them out of last season’s tournament. Ohio State has a great team this year but it is hard to beat one team, three times in a season.
I think the Wolverines will send the Buckeyes back to Columbus, as they make their trip to the tourney final with a fabulous shooting performance by freshman Tim Hardaway Jr. and junior captain, Zack Novak.
The other semi-final game should end up being between, Wisconsin and Purdue. Even though Wisconsin has been on a terror late in the season they will have no response to the Boilermaker trio of JaJuan Johnson, Louis Jackson, and E’twaun Moore.
Purdue will move on to the final to take on Michigan.
On March 13 at 3:30 ET. Every team has a chance to make it to Sunday but the battle for tourney champ will be between the Boilermakers and Wolverines. This game should be close but the inexperience of a young Michigan team will come into effect as Purdue and the Big Ten Player of The Year, JaJuan Johnson, will be crowned champions.
