It’s been more than a quarter-century since a Big Ten men’s basketball team won the NCAA tournament.
Is this the year the drought ends?
On sheer numbers … perhaps?
Half of the Big Ten – that’s nine teams – reached the tournament and six of those made the Sweet 16. (The three first-weekend losers: Ohio State and Wisconsin in tight first-round games and UCLA in a second-round game vs. 2-seed Connecticut.)
That, Michigan basketball coach Dusty May believes, is a good thing for the Big Ten in its second season as an 18-team conference.
“We’ve been cheering like crazy for the Big Ten, and everyone’s done well,” May said on Tuesday, March 24, previewing his Wolverines’ Sweet 16 matchup with Alabama on Friday, March 27 (7:35 p.m., TBS/truTV) at United Center in Chicago. “It’s important for recruiting, for future whatever the case, television rights, package, everything that goes with the enterprise of college basketball, how we do in the NCAA tournament is incredibly important.
“Not to mention the revenue and the shares the league gets for dancing.”
The Wolverines appear most likely to break the drought − with a 29.5% chance to win the a title per Evan Miya’s analytics website − but there are other teams surging as well.
Michigan State – a 3-seed this year and the most recent Big Ten titlist, in 2000 under coach Tom Izzo – faces 2-seed Connecticut in a Friday Sweet 16 matchup in the East region, widely perceived as the most difficult in March Madness. A win would earn a matchup with either 1-seed Duke, the ACC’s champ, or 5-seed St. John’s, the Big East tourney champ. All together, it feels as loaded as any regional site has been in a while.
“That’s a Final Four,” Izzo told reporters in East Lansing on Monday.
Sweet 16s are almost commonplace for MSU, which has made 17 in 28 years under Izzo. For other teams, however? Iowa stunned 1-seed Florida in the South to reach the Sweet 16 for the first time this century. The 9-seed Hawkeyes will be an underdog, however, against their foe in Houston: 4-seed Nebraska, which had never won an NCAA tournament game before this season.
Elsewhere, 2-seed Purdue is a heavy favorite to make the Elite Eight, too, given its matchup with 11-seed Texas. And then there’s 3-seed Illinois – a national runner-up in 2005 and in its sixth Sweet 16 since MSU won it all. The Illini feature one of the best offenses in the nation but have their hands full with a matchup against 2-seed Houston, a defensive juggernaut playing in … in Houston.
With six remaining – and the possibility for five to reach the Elite Eight – May knows that not only is his team primed for an deep run this year, but that a rising tide lifts all ships − including his own.
“The better all of us do, I think the more it benefits all of us in the long run,” May said. “When you’re competing in the best conference, then it’s attractive to recruits and future talent.”
Tony Garcia is the Michigan beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at apgarcia@freepress.com and follow him on X at @RealTonyGarcia.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan leads 6 Big Ten Sweet 16s; is conference due for a title?