Just Like Every Year, The Big Ten Conference Makes Me Realize I Am An Idiot

The fact that Illinois has a bye this weekend doesn't just mean that I get to spend all Saturday in my pajamas eating tacos, it also means that I get to take a moment and absorb the Big Ten conference championship race as it stands after five or six games. Every year we think we know the conference hierarchy clearly by Christmas, we see what teams are playing well, the teams they have beaten on neutral or road courts and always come away with "well it looks like ____ is just going to run away with it."

This season was of course no different. One look at Ohio State dismantling Duke in Columbus and Michigan State starting the season 0-2 basically gave us an easy script for the rest of the season. "The class of the Big Ten is clearly Ohio State, with Michigan, Wisconsin and MSU filling out the second tier, then a big glob of good Big Ten teams, then Nebraska and PSU in the caboose."

Then Indiana beat Kentucky on a buzzer beater and entered the Big Ten undefeated "wow, maybe they belong in that second tier!" Then the Hoosiers beat OSU. "Double wow! The Hoosiers are back!"

Then Iowa beats Wisconsin in Madison. Then Penn State blows out Purdue by 20. Then Brandon Paul and Illinois do this, then, just the other night 0-4 Minnesota, went into Bloomington and took it to the top ten Hoosiers.

The result is a Big Ten that looks like this.

Fran McCaffrey is a mad man people. Four of the Hawkeyes first six games have come against ranked opponents, and they have managed a 3-3 record through it. This after dropping five games pre-conference to such powerhouses as Clemson and Campbell, KenPom numbers 100 and 188 respectively.

At this point, one would assume its Michigan State's conference to lose, until you remember that the Spartans have only played one game so far against the next four teams in the standings.This conference is far far far from being decided, and I am at the point where I don't even want to bother to predict these games.

I can tell you this much at least, those close wins against Northwestern and Minnesota don't feel so ugly anymore, not when the Wildcats took Michigan to OT took the Michigan State to the woodshed on Saturday, and the Gophers pushed through the Hoosiers.

With weakness in the ACC and PAC 12, and how strong, top to bottom the Big Ten is, we could be looking at 9 of 12 teams heading to the NCAA tournament this year. Minnesota and Iowa had no business being in that discussion a week ago, now I think they legitimately are. There just aren't any bad losses to be had in this league.

For now I am just going to have to be content with the knowledge that we have another season of very competitive Big Ten basketball, and knowing that the Illini are for the first time in a while, actually in the mix for a title.

Update: After Northwestern craziness, the Illini have pulled into a tie for first place in the Big Ten, by basically sitting back and watching the other top Big Ten teams fall to home underdogs on Saturday. Thank you Northwestern and Iowa, for not just further proving my point that the Big Ten is insane this year, but for making sure that the next four weeks of basketball will be really, really compelling.