While everyone focuses on Illinois football, and rightly so, university basketball slips on the calendar.
With a little less than 50 days before the blow, it’s a good time to take a look at the Big Ten as a whole and try to find pre-season rankings.
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Let’s start.
Level 1: Contenters of the national championship
1. Purdue
Matt Painter has a wagon in West Lafayette.
Last year, the winner of the Bob Cousy Award and Big Ten player of the year Braden Smith is back. The All-League interpreter, Trey Kauffman-Renn, is back.
The boilers come back almost everyone from Sweet Swew Squad in recent years and add Omer Mayer from Israel, they also receive the 7 -foot Monster Daniel Jacobsen from injury and have added southern Dakota transfer burgioles to strengthen the court before, in particular defensively.
Three starters from the National Boilermakers Championship match in 2024 are still in black and gold. You cannot put a price on this experience. Guard Play wins in March, and Purdue has the best guard in the country.
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If Purdue does not make the Final Four, this season is a disappointment.
Tier 2: Final Four Contenters
2: UCLA, 3: Michigan, 4: Illinois
The UCLA brings back three experienced starters and added one of the best players in the Donovan Dent transfer portal.
Tyler Bilodeau burnt down the Ellini last season, Skyy Clark, more commonly known as Benedict Arnold, is back for his senior season, and Eric Dailey is a good complementary piece.
It could be a hot catch, but I’m really at the top of the Bruins this year.
Dusty May had the turnaround for Michigan.
May and Michigan have gone crazy in the portal, picking up Yaxel Lendeborg from the UAB, surpassing several other major major teams.
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Aday Mara 7-foot 4 inches comes from the UCLA, the old 5-star playmaker Elliot Gift joins the UNC, and the Wolverines Rame-Back in Nimari Burnett and Roddy Gayle.
Do not let the talent be wrong, however, they will be led by transfer playmaker MOREZ Johnson.
It was well documented, in particular on this site on the European Elinois stars team.
Kylan Boswell is back, and if he continues his spectacular end in his junior campaign, the ceiling already high for this team from Illini is even higher.
The additions of Andrej Stojakovic of Cal and Mihailo Petrovic from Europe should give Boswell and Tomislav Ivisic the pieces to run.
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Tier 3: Contenters of the second weekend
5: Oregon, 6: Wisconsin, 7: Michigan State, 8: Iowa
The 3 best coaches of this level always do the work.
Wisconsin and the state of Michigan had low pre-season expectations a year ago, but they both produced large seasons.
Badgers bring John Blackwell and Nolan Winter, and they added parts in the portal like Nick Boyd from San Diego State. Greg Gard’s teams are still fighting, and he takes the best party of his guys.
The Michigan State has lost a lot of its Big Ten championship team, but Coen Carr looks ready for a season of small groups. At this point, you just need to take into account the Tom Izzo effect. I don’t like their list makeup – there are not many proven parts – but Izzo is Izzo.
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Dana Altman is as coherent as they come and he has his two best players at Jackson Shelstad and Nate Bittle.
You can easily move ducks in this final level of Final Four.
The Iowa hired Ben McCollum from Drake and the Hawkeyes brought a class of transfer portal titled by Bennett Stintz.
Expect a reversal of Hawkeyes in the first year of the McCollum era.
Tier 4: NCAA tournament teams
9: Indiana, 10: Ohio State, 11: Washington, 12: USC, 13: Maryland
This is where things become really difficult.
It is difficult to imagine that the big tens send 13 teams to the NCAA tournament, but all these teams are solid and should dance in March.
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Indiana brings Darian and Tucker Devries after a year to West Virginia, and they also brought one of the best players in the country in the country in Lamar Wilkerson in Sam Houston’s state.
However, there is no continuity of last year’s team (which is probably a good thing).
I will believe it when I see it with Jake Diebler and this kernel of Ohio State, but a tournament offer is certainly in the cards. Bruce Thornton is one of the best players in America, and continuity is there for Buckeyes with Devin Royal and John Mobley in Columbus. It is a year of a brand to deble.
Danny Sprinkle did not have an easy task to rebuild this Washington program, but the Huskies came out and made this off -season a few movements.
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They hung Wesley Yates and Desmond Claude from the USC, and Sprinkle took a page from Brad Underwood with Hannes Steinbach from Germany.
The Eric Musselman era of the USC did not succeed in the greatest departures, but the Trojan horses added Chad Baker-Mazarra, sixth year, 26 years of Auburn. Shouldn’t he work a 9 to 5 at the moment? Musselman also added the known killer of Illinois Rodney Rice of Maryland.
The terraaps are in an interesting place after losing Kevin Willard, so they hung the known program Hopper Buzz Williams to fill the gap after their most successful season of the decade.
They added Myles Rice from Indiana and Williams brought some of his Texas A&M guys to Solomon Washington and Pharrell Payne. In my opinion, one of the most intriguing teams in the League this year.
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Tier 5: NCAA tournament bubble
14: Nebraska, 15: North-West, 16: Minnesota
Fred Hoiberg did a solid job in Lincoln.
A dead program has a kind of expectations, especially after the breakup of Burners ago, where they made the NCAA tournament (Shoutout Keisei Tominaga)
The big Brice Williams program has disappeared, but the Huskers bring nothingk Mast from the injury and with Jamarques Lawrence transferring, the plot is there for Hoiball.
Nick Martinelli is back in Northwestern and the senior feeling is the top scorer in the league. The ball seems to find the basket when he leaves his hands. Apart from him, however, the closet is naked for Chris Collins and Co.
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The Niko Medved era begins in Minnesota, and it has difficult work. Medved led the Colorado State near the second weekend last season. Gophers have added a Cade Tyson and Cal Transfer BJ Omot, both who seek to bounce back.
Tier 6: just have fun
17. Rutgers, 18. Penn State
It seemed that Steve Pikiell had something special in Piscataway with Geo Baker, Ron Harper Jr., Caleb McConnell and Cliff Omoruyi. This nucleus brought Rutgers into a higher level in Big Ten.
Last year, Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper were as announced, perhaps even better, but they did not have much distribution. Now they are without Bailey and Harper, and it’s just this cast of support for YMCA.
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The era of Mike Rhoades Penn State will remain in the memories for a single match: the strangulation work of Illinois in early 2024. Penn State lost Ace Baldwin and his first choice of recovery from the NBA, Yanic Konan Niederhauser.
It will take nothing less than a miracle for Rutgers or Penn State to win more seven championship games this season.
