When we at Badgers Wire share our stories on social media outlets, we hear from readers who comment on these stories. Just the other day, we posted the story about where ESPN’s Joe Lunardi placed the Wisconsin Badgers in his bracketology column. The immediate guess from one commenter was that Lunardi would have the Badgers as a No. 9 seed. That’s roughly where I expected the Badgers to be as well. Yet, Lunardi had the Badgers as a 7 seed. Remember: This was January 28, AFTER (not before) the loss to Iowa which dropped the Badgers to 12-9.
Yes, a 12-9 record normally means the bubble, but I am going to be repeating myself a lot in the next few weeks: This season, normal bubble records don’t mean much. The Atlantic Coast Conference has only three really good teams: Duke, Louisville, and Florida State. Therefore, when teams 4 through 15 in the ACC beat each other, they aren’t getting the quality wins they normally would have gained in previous years. Beating the seventh-place ACC team this season is an NIT or CBI-level victory, not an NCAA Tournament-level victory.
This domino effect exists on a smaller scale in other major conferences. There is a dearth of bids to be handed out. Few teams are making airtight arguments for lock status in the 2020 NCAA Tournament. This is why Wisconsin is still WELL above the bubble cut line entering Saturday’s game against Michigan State, which begins the month of February. (It also begins the month in which we take bracketology seriously. Anything before late January is a waste of time.)
With all of this in mind, let’s put forth the question: Was it a good thing for Wisconsin that the Illinois Fighting Illini beat the Minnesota Golden Gophers on Thursday night? To me, the answer is clearly yes.
Let’s explain: The Big Ten has a chance to put 12 teams in the NCAA Tournament. No, I wouldn’t expect that it will, but it’s possible. If the eighth through 12th teams in the conference all trade/exchange/balance wins to lift all boats, not just one or two, it can happen.
This is what Wisconsin should want: The Badgers need some exchanges of wins among the teams in the No. 8-12 spots in the conference. Wisconsin does NOT want teams 8-12 to ALL crumble while a stronger top seven solidifies. That means the No. 8 team in the league becomes more of an NIT candidate and less of an NCAA candidate. Wisconsin needs at least nine or 10 Big Ten teams to remain good.
However, Wisconsin doesn’t need more than 10 teams to be good. Wisconsin — especially if it loses several more games (which is quite possible, given everything going on inside the program) — will move a lot closer to the bubble. It will be a bubble team. Viewed in this context, the No. 11 and 12 teams in the Big Ten are bubble competitors for Wisconsin. (No. 10 is too, but that’s where the Badgers need to know that beating the No. 10 Big Ten team is a good win rather than a mediocre one. It’s a balancing act.)
If there are a few teams at the bottom of the Big Ten bubble pile, Minnesota is one of them. Minnesota, Purdue, Michigan, and Ohio State are below Wisconsin in the bubble pecking order. Wisconsin would like two of those teams to remain good so that wins over them are valuable, but Wisconsin doesn’t want all four to be good. If all four are good, that’s two more bubble teams UW has to worry about.
Illinois over Minnesota makes the Gophers a less credible bubble team. Wisconsin losing to the Illini looks better, not worse. This is a good bubble result. We will continue to have these discussions in the month of February.