![]() ![]() In Bart Torvik’s performance against seed expectation metric, from 2000 to 2019, the Big Ten had 24.1 more wins than would be expected based on the seeds its teams earned. But other than that, the Big Ten had been thriving in the Big Dance. The Big Ten was already the subject of one long-standing, highly publicized NCAA Tournament drought: The league hasn’t won a national title on the men’s side since Michigan State did so in 2000. 1 Using the pre-tournament odds in FiveThirtyEight’s forecast model, the chance of Wisconsin, Illinois and Iowa all failing to reach the Sweet 16 was less than 1 in 8 (12 percent). In this year’s first weekend, the Big Ten’s regular-season co-champions (Wisconsin and Illinois) and conference tournament champion (Iowa) flamed out. 2 Ohio State suffered the tournament’s biggest upset, against No. Three top-two seeds failed to reach the second weekend last season, as No. 1 seed Michigan made the second weekend out of the nine Big Ten teams in the tournament.Ĭonsidering the draws that Big Ten teams have been awarded, three Sweet 16 teams in two years amounts to a pitiful showing. That’s more than the league could say last year, when only No. 3 seed Purdue - have advanced to this year’s Sweet 16. Only two of the Big Ten’s nine NCAA Tournament teams - No. In the last year of that span, Michigan State crashed the Final Four in vintage Big Ten fashion: Coach Tom Izzo took issue with his team’s draw from the selection committee, and then the Spartans made the final weekend by upsetting a top-seeded Duke squad with three future top-10 NBA draft picks.īut all of a sudden, and almost all at once, the league’s heavyweights have started imploding on the sport’s biggest stage. ![]() From 2000 to 2019, the Big Ten reached 16 Final Fours, most of any conference, and 48 Sweet 16s, two shy of the ACC’s 50 - despite the fact that the ACC earned 37 top-two seeds and the Big Ten totaled only 21. In the first two decades of this century, no league was better at maximizing its opportunities in the men’s NCAA Tournament. March used to be a banner month for the Big Ten. This article is part of our March Madness series. ![]()
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