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Talk about an great weekend of conference play. Not only was there the epic showdown between the Indiana Hoosiers and Purdue Boilermakers on Saturday night, but fans were also treated to an overtime game on Saturday evening between the Nebraska Cornhuskers and Ohio State Buckeyes and a really fun game on Sunday afternoon between the Maryland Terrapins and Michigan Wolverines. The weekend has left things closer than ever in the standings too.
With that, let's take a look at the Big Ten Tournament bracket.
The concept of the bracket 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 Sunday, February 21, 2016. 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.
2016 Big Ten Tournament Bracket (2/21):
Thoughts:
Once again, things have spaced out a bit more this week. However, as things have been going, odds are that things will get wild again by next week. The gap from first to third is still one game and the gap from fourth through eighth is also one game as well.
Needless to say, any win or loss could dramatically reshape things.
At the top of the standings, the Indiana Hoosiers remained as the No. 1 seed after taking care of business against Nebraska and Purdue at home. Maryland split its games, but still had enough to hold onto the No. 3 seed. The interesting battle is going to be for that last double-bye, especially with the momentum Michigan State has right now. Additionally, it is crazy to see Ohio State sitting at No. 4 right now given the early season struggles for the Buckeyes.
In the middle, Michigan State is sitting in great position to move up further and Michigan, Purdue, and Wisconsin are all narrowly behind the Spartans. It's anyone's guess who ends up finishing where in that section. It is interesting to see Penn State move out of the first day of the Big Ten Tournament as well.
At the bottom, Minnesota and Rutgers maintained the bottom two spots with Illinois and Northwestern narrowly above those two teams. At this point, it's pretty much guaranteed that Illinois, Minnesota, and Rutgers are going to take at least three of those bottom spots. The only question is who will be the fourth team.
We'll have to see how next week impacts things, but it looks like an exciting race in the Big Ten.