An interesting week in the Big 10 with a few teams missing some big opportunities. Ohio State makes it through another week unscathed and is the lone undefeated team in Big 10 play after Purdue suffered a heartbreaking loss at Minnesota. Illinois hurt their Big 10 chances by losing at Penn State and Wisconsin left a major opportunity on the table when they blew a late lead at Michigan State. No one expected to compete for the Big 10 title has lost a home game yet.
Best Win - This has to go to Penn State, hanging on to beat Illinois 57-55 in beating consecutive ranked opponents for the first time since 1954. Taylor Battle was incredibly clutch, hitting a few very important threes late, including about a 35 footer as the shot clock expired. Penn State was active defensively and, just like in the win against Michigan State, they forced Illinois to turn the ball over and over.
Worst Loss - The worst loss distinction falls to Wisconsin this week, losing to Michigan State in East Lansing in a game that Wisconsin led by 9 with 4 minutes to play, and by 5 with 1:17 to play. Wisconsin lost an opportunity to pull out a win that Ohio State, Purdue, Illinois and Minnesota will struggle to pull off. As such, Wisconsin has the worst loss of the week.
Power Rankings
1) Ohio State (18-0, 5-0). Ohio State had a 2-0 week, winning at Ann Arbor 68-64 and escaping with a home win over Penn State 69-66. The Buckeyes continue to let inferior teams hang around and have struggled mightily to close out games. As we have mentioned before, Ohio State has the best starting 5 in the league, but they are barely going 7 deep right now. Aaron Craft is logging huge minutes (and played some terrific defense on Taylor Battle at the end of the Penn State game), but Deshaun Thomas is the only other sub that is playing at all. Against Michigan, Lighty and Buford played 40 minutes, Diebler 38 minutes and Sullinger 35 minutes. Craft played 32 minutes off the bench. Those kind of minutes could explain why the Buckeyes are struggling to close out games. The Buckeyes host Iowa Wednesday and then have their first road test of the season when they travel to Illinois Saturday.
2) Purdue (15-3, 4-1). After Ohio State, no one has looked particularly good. Wisconsin and even Michigan State could lay claim to the second spot. Purdue's best win in the Big 10 thus far looks like a win at Penn State. And they had a rough week, losing a game they should have won at Minnesota 70-67 and then losing to West Virginia 68-64 (another game Purdue should have won). Against Minnesota, Purdue wasted 29 points and 11 rebounds from JaJuan Johnson. E'Twaun Moore was 2-14 and Ryne Smith was just 1-4 after shooting 11-14 from three the week before. Purdue had plenty of chances. Neither team scored in the final 3:17 of the game. Purdue wasted another good effort from Johnson at West Virginia as he had 26 points and 7 rebounds in Morganstown. E'Twaun Moore, however was 6-18 and Ryne Smith was a non-factor. If Moore continues to struggle, Purdue will not hold the number 2 spot in the power rankings much longer. Purdue hosts Penn State on Wednesday and Michigan State Saturday.
3) Wisconsin (13-4, 3-2). As stated above, Wisconsin wasted a huge opportunity this week when they choked away the game in East Lansing. They rebounded very well Saturday in an unwatchable, but well deserved, 76-66 win over Illinois in Madison. Why was that game unwatchable? Because in the second half, the officials made the decision to not allow either team to play defense without calling a foul. Demetri McCamey shot 21 free throws for Illinois and Jordan Taylor shot 18 for Wisconsin. The game lasted almost two and a half hours. But Wisconsin was the better team and continues to be a very difficult out at home. While Purdue struggles to find a consistent second scorer, Wisconsin may have found a reliable third option in Keaton Nankivil. Nankivil, your typical good shooting and strong rebounding Wisconsin big man, has now reached double figures in 8 of his last 9 games. Nankivil has proven a perfect complement to Taylor and Jon Leuer in the Big 10. The Badgers host Indiana on Thursday and travel to Northwestern Sunday.
4) Michigan State (12-5, 4-1). Michigan State leapfrogs back over Illinois in the power rankings behind two overtime wins this week. They grabbed the aforementioned win over Wisconsin 64-61 and then held off Northwestern 71-67 in overtime at home. Durrell Summers struggled mightily this week as the Spartans leading scoring heading into the week was a combined 3-11 from the floor. Freshman guard Keith Appling had a coming out party of sorts scoring 19 against Northwestern. Michigan State is hoping that Appling will provide them with another scoring option going forward. Michigan State has an extremely important week ahead with road games at Illinois Tuesday and Purdue Saturday. Winning one of those two would make Michigan State feel very good going forward.
5) Illinois (13-5, 3-2). Just an awful week for the Illini with losses at Penn State and at Wisconsin. The Illini are far too reliant on Demetri McCamey for offense. There really is not much more to their struggles than that. Unlike Purdue, Wisconsin or Michigan State, Illinois cannot overcome bad games from their star. McCamey was 3-8 against Penn State and 3-13 (though 17-21 from the foul line) against Wisconsin. If McCamey is not scoring, Illinois is not winning. Of their other options, Brandon Paul is staying more within himself and played well against Wisconsin (15 points), but is still far too inconsistent (most notably in his shot selection). Mike Tisdale is not strong enough to establish position in the post against good teams and is pretty much just a 7 foot jump shooter (Mike Davis has similar issues). Jereme Richmond is not a good enough ball handler or shooter yet to provide more than hustle points. DJ Richardson is just a jump shooter. The bottom line is that Illinois goes as McCamey goes. They will look to rebound this week with home games against Michigan State Tuesday and Ohio State Saturday. A 2-0 week is necessary for the Illini to bounce back in the Big 10 race.
6) Minnesota (14-4, 3-3). Minnesota survived the brutal portion of their schedule, and has survived significant team unrest on top of that (Devoe Joseph transfers, Trevor Mbakwe is arrested). While the Gophers have been unable to steal that marquee road game (losing at Michigan State, Ohio State and Wisconsin), they have held serve at home and remain in the Big 10 race through three weeks. Blake Hoffarber carried Minnesota to a huge home win against Purdue early in the week (26 points on 10-15 shooting in a 70-67 win). Mbakwe had 16 points and 12 rebounds "off the bench" against Iowa (he played 35 minutes) as the Gophers overcame a poor night from Hoffarber (2-10 from the floor). Minnesota has just one game this week, heading to Ann Arbor Saturday.
7) Penn State (10-7, 3-3). Unlike every team below them, Penn State has finished tough games. They closed out games at home against both Michigan State and Illinois (57-55 this week) and have proven that they are a team no one in the conference wants to play (as evidenced by their 69-66 loss at Ohio State). Taylor Battle is still the star (26 points against Illinois and 15 against Ohio State). The supporting case, however, is thriving when Battle sees increased attention. Against Ohio State, Battle was just 5-17 from the floor, but the other 4 starters were 19-25. The Nittany Lions are no longer just the Taylor Battles. Penn State has only one game this week, traveling to Purdue Wednesday.
8) Northwestern (11-5, 2-4). Northwestern put in a dominant performance at Iowa early this week but they let another game slip away against Michigan State, losing in overtime at East Lansing Saturday. Again, if Northwestern is to make the NCAA tournament, they will need to win those games. Northwestern has another extremely important week with three home games, hosting Michigan Tuesday, SIU-Edwardsville Thursday, and Wisconsin Sunday. A 3-0 week for Northwestern would go a long way toward helping them back into the NCAA tournament picture.
9) Michigan (11-7, 1-4). Michigan is a very difficult team to figure out. Last weekend, they take Kansas to overtime. Tuesday, they battle against Ohio State, losing 68-64. But then Saturday, they are blown out at Indiana 80-61 in a game they were never really in. The answer to Michigan is that they have to defend well to win. When you shot 43% as a team, you need to hold teams to under 70 points to have a chance to win. Michigan travels to Northwestern Tuesday and hosts Minnesota Saturday.
10) Indiana (10-8, 1-4). Indiana is out of the Hobbserver cellar behind an impressive 80-61home win over Michigan. With that being said, allow me to blow your mind with the following stat: Indiana is 9th in the country in field goal percentage. 9th... in the entire country. This may be a bad Indiana team, and this may be (is) more or less indicative of Indiana's soft preseason schedule than anything else, but it is an impressive state nonetheless. Indiana will look to build on their first Big 10 win with a Sunday showdown at Iowa. They also travel to Kohl Thursday to play Wisconsin.
11) Iowa (7-10, 0-5). Welcome to the Hobbserver cellar Iowa. The last winless team in Big 10 play, Iowa was blown out by Northwestern Wednesday and struggled against Minnesota in a 69-59 loss Sunday. Freshman Melsahn Basabe had his second huge game of the Big 10 season with 20 points and 13 rebounds against a tough Minnesota frontcourt. Iowa travels to Ohio State Wednesday before starting a stretch of 3 winnable games by hosting Indiana Sunday.
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