Basketball Q&A with Blogging the Bracket.

by Joe Kutsunis on Oct 14, 2009 3:31 AM CDT Comment 1 comment

The star studded week of basketball enthusiasm continues as we direct questions to Chris from Blogging the Bracket, SB Nation's resident bracketologist and basketball guru. Lets see what he says about the great grindy Big Ten.

HTTO: The Illini surprised alot of people by finishing second in the Big Ten and returning to the NCAA tournament. This year the team loses two starting guards in Chester Frazier and Trent Meacham, but gain several highly regarded freshmen, overall do you see the Illini taking a step forward or backward this year?

I think the Illini will take a bit of a step back without Frazier and Meacham, but they'll still be a contender for an NCAA bid, and maybe in the conference. Demetri McCarney is a good point guard, and if he's as motivated as the offseason chatter says he is, Illinois will have the right guy running the offense. Alex Legion HAS to be better than he was in his first year in Champaign. If Mike Tisdale can be more aggressive down low, the Big Ten better watch out. He already shoots well enough from the field and the foul line to be a force, but he's got to get himself more opportunities to up his scoring average of 10 per game. Mike Davis was only two rebounds short of averaging a double-double last season, so he's likely to have a huge year inside as well. If Bruce Weber can get good numbers out of Dominique Keller, you may see fewer three-guard sets this season.

The freshman class is a talented, local group. Weber has been criticized for not getting the big time local talent, and he did a nice job of quieting those critics with this class. D.J. Richardson's experience at Findlay Prep means he should adjust to the college game quickly. His defensive skills will help fill the void left by Frazier's graduation. Brandon Paul will be a versatile scorer, which the Illini needs. Joseph Bertrand should learn a lot from McCarney over the next two years and give Bruce Weber some good minutes at the point. Tyler Griffey, much like Keller, gives the Illini an inside option beyond Tisdale and Davis if he can show some consistency, especially on the rebounding front.

HTTO: The Big Ten has the makings of a very competitive season, with the talent gap seemingly the slimmest it has ever been. Is it still MSU's conference to lose, or will one of the many challengers take the title from them?

I really think the Spartans are going to miss Goran Suton in the middle and Travis Walton's defense, and that really gives Purdue, Ohio State, or if things break right, Michigan and Minnesota, the chance to steal the league crown from them. If the freshmen mature quickly, the Illini could even surprise and contend.

HTTO: Along those same lines, this looks like it could be a banner year for the Big Ten, with MSU going to the NCAA finals and Penn State winning the NIT and nearly all of the top talent from last year's teams returning do you see the conference flexing its muscle come tournament time? How many teams do you expect to come from the Big Ten in the NCAA tourney, and how do you rank it along with the other conferences this year.

The Big Ten is going to have a great chance to build on the strong showing it had in last year's postseason, especially with the Big East probably being a bit down and the Pac-10 likely being way down. Obviously, I think MSU and Purdue will get high seeds.

For the rest of the league, it's crucial that they make a real statement during the non-conference season. Otherwise, it could be a repeat of last season, where everyone outside of MSU, Purdue, and Illinois really beat the tar out of each other in the league and didn't have the wins outside of the conference to boost themselves out of the middle of the bracket.

From a bid perspective, I think the Spartans, Boilermakers, Buckeyes, Wolverines, Gophers, and Illini are a safe group of six. Beyond that, I feel the only two teams who don't have much hope this season are Indiana and Iowa. While Wisconsin may be down, I'm never going to discount a Bo Ryan-coached team. Northwestern has a real shot at getting their first-ever bid, but they cannot do their usual thing where they lose a headscratcher or two at the end of the year. Penn State will have some real momentum from their NIT triumph and they have a shot to get some decent wins at the Charleston Classic, but it may not be enough with how good the rest of the league will be.

HTTO: Illinois, the state that is, along with Indiana and Ohio routinely manufacture a lot of top tier basketball talent, but are also some of the most often "raided" states by other schools. Do you believe that the reputation of the Big Ten as a low scoring tough defense conference has hurt it in terms of recruiting? The up and down score happy ACC has enjoyed a more positive national reputation (and the benefit of the ACC/Big Ten challenge dominance.) In short what do you believe is the national perception of the conference, and how does it, in your opinion affect recruiting and performance?

Speaking as an SEC grad who grew up watching the Big East, I admit that I make plenty of jokes throughout the season about many Big Ten matchups setting basketball back to Naismith's time. But really, if you look at non-conference and postseason performance, the criticism is pretty unfounded. I mean, eight Big Ten teams have made the Final Four in this decade, albeit with only one winning (MSU in 2000). From a recruiting perspective, it's harder to say. I honestly don't spend a ton of time on recruiting over at my site because a lot of it is a crapshoot. And the Big Ten experience is a great example of this. Sure, Big Ten schools may sign as many McDonald's All-Americans as their counterparts in the other major conferences, but they do land a lot of talented players who believe in teamwork and are coachable. When you combine those two characteristics with the coaching talent in the conference, you're going to end up with teams that feature a lot of "diamonds in the rough" who go on to shock the experts

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