BTPowerhouse's 3/4 Big Ten Tournament Bracketology: Michigan State Claims #3 Seed

With the Big Ten moving closer to the end of the regular season and we will be updating our 2015 Big Ten Tournament bracket more often. Instead of a weekly update, we will be posting updates after each set of games have concluded. As such, we will take a look at the bracket following Wednesday's set of games.

The concept is pretty simple. Each time, BTP will breakdown how the Big Ten Tournament projects as of that moment. For instance, today's bracket will be set as of the night of Wednesday, March 4, 2015. I have taken the liberty of looking at the Big Ten records and using the Big Ten tiebreaker scenarios to see where teams will land. Things will certainly move, but it is still interesting to see as of this moment. Let's take a look.

2015 B1G Tournament Bracket (3/4):

Thoughts

With another set of games, there was more movement in the standings.  The #1 and #2 seeds remained unchanged with Wisconsin and Maryland off for the night, but there was a lot of movement below them.  In fact, the #3 through #6 seeds are all currently tied at 11-6 in the standings.  It's pretty unlikely that all of these teams will remain tied by Sunday night, but it's an extremely close race.

Right now, Michigan State is the #3 seed and Iowa is the #4 seed, but the tiebreakers are pretty close to say the least.  The Spartans will have tiebreaker over all 3 of these teams as they are a combined 3-0 against the other teams, but Iowa's claim to the #4 seed relies on its win over Maryland.  Purdue currently holds the edge over Ohio State for the #5 seed, but if it was a single team head-to-head tie between these two, Ohio State would win.  Essentially, it's a complete mess from #3 to #6 and two teams going to get a double-bye as a result.

For the single-bye teams, there were actually no changes from the #7 through #10 seeds.  Things could certainly move in the coming days between these teams, but they look solid at the moment.  Keep an eye on the race for the #7 seed as that team gets to be on the opposite side of the bracket as Wisconsin.

At the bottom, there was no change as Nebraska fell to Illinois on the road.  Nebraska and Northwestern are separated by a game and Penn State and Rutgers are separated by a game.  The Huskers and Wildcats are still technically in play for the #10 seed, but they both have work to do to get there.

BTPowerhouse will have more bracket updates as the week continues so stay tuned.