Well I'll say this next three we should win. Gets us to 5-6. If we can grow a pair on the tiad and beat either Iowa or I4 than beat NW. Will be 7-7. Than the next three get hard
Penn State road win a must for any comeback kids scenario.
We're 2-6. 10 to play, 5 each on road and at home. Win the 5 at home including win over the big red machine WI and go 2-3 on the road we get back to par. That's the up hill battle this club has given the self-dug trench it excavated.
We legitimately need to find a way to go 9-9 and make a finals appearance in the conference tournament or we're done.
I think if the team goes 9-9 and gets even one conference tournament victory, they likely will be selected.
To go 9-9, the team would have to go 7-3 the rest of the way. Even if they won all five games against the lowest opponents (PSU (2), Nebraska, NW, and Purdue), they would still have to win two of the following:
Wisconsin (2)
Mich State, away
Indiana, away
Iowa, away
I don't see the team pulling this off, but if they did, I think the team crosses the threshold and won't need more than one Big Ten tournament win. Remember, if the team finishes 9-9, they are probably seeded somewhere around 7th or 8th and start the tournament with a pretty fair opponent.
At this point, I just have a hard time believing that 8 B1G teams are making the tournament. I think we're probably looking at 6 with an outside chance at 7. So 9-9 could do it, but I think we'll need to make a pretty good push in the conference tournament to get over the hump.
I don't think 8 will get in but I would say that there is a very good chance that 7 get in. They have picked 7 teams when the conference was only 11 teams and they picked 7 teams two years ago when the conference was only 12 teams.
I know some people think that the Big Ten is much weaker this year, but even if that is somewhat true, I don't think that will make much difference in the number of teams selected. The tournament has to pick 68 teams and if it picks only 6 Big Ten teams, that will put too much pressure on the NIT, with only 32 openings, to pick more Big Ten teams than it would probably want to. Right now the Big Ten is #4 among conferences in the Sagarin Ratings. The conference ranks ahead of the SEC and the Pac 12 and has virtually the same point rating as the #3 ACC.
I think if the team goes 9-9 and gets even one conference tournament victory, they likely will be selected.
To go 9-9, the team would have to go 7-3 the rest of the way. Even if they won all five games against the lowest opponents (PSU (2), Nebraska, NW, and Purdue), they would still have to win two of the following:
Wisconsin (2)
Mich State, away
Indiana, away
Iowa, away
I don't see the team pulling this off, but if they did, I think the team crosses the threshold and won't need more than one Big Ten tournament win. Remember, if the team finishes 9-9, they are probably seeded somewhere around 7th or 8th and start the tournament with a pretty fair opponent.
The NCAA runs the NIT.