I feel like we need one of these separate from the Buckeyes-titled thread. I love college basketball, even now in the high roster turnover, free transfer, NIL, conference realignment era. It is my favorite sport, by far. From now until early April, almost every day is like Christmas to me.
For those of you who feel similarly but don't have the time (or subscription money) to watch as many games as you'd like, I can't recommend highly enough the YouTube channel Matthew Loves Ball. He basically edits out all the TV ads and game breaks and leaves most of the good stuff in. It's a great way to catch up on a lot of different games without just getting the highlights.
Just gonna kick this thread off with a B1G observation: The conference really, really needs to start winning some important games. To date, the best wins are MSU at home against Butler (who might not be good), scUM at St. John's (who might not be good), Rutgers at home vs. Georgetown (probably not good), and Purdue at home against Xavier (who also might not be good, but is probably at least decent).
Someone correct me if wrong, but I believe B1G teams have dropped every other non-con game of note, while teams like OSU, Illinois, and Indiana have struggled against some of the mid-majors (most egregiously IU against Army). Rutgers has already lost to Princeton and Maryland has looked terrible on offense, dropping 3 games, two of those losses to Davidson and UAB. The other night scUM negated their St. John's win by losing to a 1-2 Long Beach State team. MSU lost at home to JMU. Wisconsin lost to good teams but still lost and got absolutely smacked down by Providence. Illinois and OSU lost good games at home to the only high quality opponents they have played so far. Minnesota at home had Mizzou on the ropes but then still found a way to lose. Iowa was very competitive at Creighton but came up short. Though I will say that Iowa is looking about the same level as they always are despite no more Murrays (now they're into Sandforts). Also, I will say that Nebraska has pretty convincingly beat all the not-good teams they have played (odd stat: 3 out of their first 5 games the Huskers have scored 84 points and their last two games the final score was 84-63 in both. Weird!)
Really, Northwestern might have the "best" resume so far since they have no losses and a couple wins over decent A10 teams, Dayton and Rhode Island.
Right or wrong, the B1G has been getting a lot of teams into the Dance because of early season non-con performance and then everyone in the conference beating each other up but getting "quality wins" in the process while minimizing "bad losses." Right now the B1G is looking like a 5 or 6-bid league, that's how poor the collective profile is. Pretty sure teams like MSU, IU, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Maryland are quite a bit better than they are playing currently, but it doesn't help them or anyone else in the B1G if they don't start performing like it before conference play.
