Cats shoot 70% in the first half and hit 7 of 11 on 3’s.
Halftime: 53-41 Cats leading.
Preston has 4 dunks so far, looks like he’s maturing in the paint.
The scoring pace dropped off in the 2nd half, but the Cats won 90-66.
Cats win going away 90 -66. The 90 points was the most this year for the Cats in a regulation conference game . Let’s hope the big win gives them some momentum going into the BT tourney
Harry
With the pace of the game, the Cats’ ONE turnover (with 3 minutes left) was amazing. Taking care of the ball will serve them well in the games to come.
Nebraska beats Michigan, Purdue beats Wisconsin, so Nebraska gets the 3 seed in Minneapolis and Northwestern gets the 4 seed.
Hadn’t noticed that the venue had changed to Minneapolis this year. Certainly not as centrally located or at least as easy a drive for several schools as it is to Indianapolis Hope there isn’t bad weather out there later this week for the fans who are driving
Harry
Midwest weather has been super mild since the new year. We had more snow in November than we’ve had in 2024 so far. Decent amount of rain so spring planting should be okay.
60-51-52-47-40 as highs between Wednesday and Sunday with little chance of precipitation.
Not having to play until Friday will hopefully help us.
So we play in the late game of the Friday afternoon session, approximately 2:30 EDT/1:30 CDT, but we don’t know who our likely opponent is, much less all the possibilities.
Wisconsin is currently sitting in the 5-spot, but Iowa can take it from them by beating Illinois. The 5 will play the winner of Wednesday’s 12v13 game. Rutgers is locked in as the 13; the 12-seed will be the loser of tonight’s Maryland@Penn State game.
-Michael
Stetson University gets an invite to the dance for the first time. We have some company!
One of my roommates during freshman year sister was attending the school She was a good older sister, calling every weekend ( when long distance rates were about 60 percent cheaper than M-F, 8-5) to check up on him
Harry
And that’s a wrap on the Big Ten Men’s Basketball regular season!
Wisconsin will play the winner of Maryland-Rutgers on Thursday. We get the winner of that on Friday afternoon.
-Michael
“Wisconsin will play the winner of Maryland-Rutgers on Thursday. We get the winner of that on Friday afternoon”
And after that, I believe the Path for the Cats will be, if they can make it so, will be Wisconsin, Purdue and Illinois
Go Cats! Make it so.
Lou Martinaitis
Is it better to be 1 and done, play 2 less games, and get 2 days more rest OR win it all and still be at best a 7 and still likely in the 8-10 seed area?
If I had a choice of being a 10 with more rest or a 7 with less rest I would choose the 10. If we are healthy I think we can’t take down any 2+ seed playing a solid game. The 1s are a different animal and I think our success against Purdue is because we know them and their best player intimately and aren’t intimidated.
At the moment the bracket consensus seems to be an 8 seed, although where is all over the lot. I don’t think one win, even Wisconsin, will be enough to get a 7, unless there is some chaos in conference tourneys. Should the Cats beat Wisconsin and then Purdue, then a 7 is likely. I don’t see us dropping to a 10 even losing the first game of the B1G tourney. We appear to eb abled into an 8/9 seed unless we can win two games in Minneapolis. I agree that chances are better against a 2 then a 1 but if Nicholson is out, i don’t see us beating Purdue or later a 1 or 2 seed.
Go Cats
Mark
I was just taking it one game at a time, but yes! If everything else plays out according to the seedings, that’s the route to a championship! Personally, I’d like to see Iowa come through the bottom half of the bracket so that our path would be Wisconsin, Purdue, Iowa. We win the title by beating two of the three teams we didn’t beat during the regular season.
-Michael
10 seed playing Florida in Memphis in Purdue’s region.
https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/bracketology/
9 seed
https://www.foxsports.com/stories/college-basketball/2024-ncaa-tournament-projections
I like CBS better as we avoid the #1 seed in round 2 and we stay close to home.
Am I the only one who leans (ever so slightly) toward wanting to win a Big Ten championship more than wanting to make the Sweet 16?
BTW, ideally, I’d also like to see MSU upset Purdue. I think that if Nicholson is borderline and we have to play Edy, Nicholson comes back for that game. If MSU can do the dirty work for us and eliminate Purdue, Nicholson doesn’t come back until the NCAAs and is that much more healthy.
-Michael
I don’t care about the Big Ten tournament in the least. Whatever. We finished tied for third in the season. Just like last year we finished second.
I hope we lose against Wisconsin and get some rest.
As for whatever seeding and wherever we get sent by the so-called experts — none of these people know anything. They’re fun to read. But we might as well be consulting Nancy Reagan’s astrologist.
I agree with Alan.
Sweet 16 would be the basketball equivalent of making it to a New Years 6 bowl. Very significant as you are talked about as a Cinderella for an entire week.
Final 4 would be making it to the Rose Bowl. It would redefine our basketball program is everybody’s mind.
I haven’t taken the time to chart how this particular team deals with rest. Some teams perform better, some worse. Getting Nicholson back will be a boost, but that date is unrelated to the number of games NU plays in the conference tournament.
I agree that doing well at the Big Dance is going to pay WAY more dividends than doing well in the B1G tournament.
But I believe that there is also an argument that can be made for momentum. Good play in the B1G tournament can easily carry over to a sense of destiny in the Big Dance.
In general, I’m just happy that NU basketball is again relevant even if it is during an otherwise down year for some of the traditionally dominant B1G teams.
If nothing else, it would be nice to lay down a marker on the B1G landscape this year because there will be four new teams added to the mix next year.
As far as what Joan Quigley (Nancy Reagan’s astrologer) might say, we’ll never know. She passed on ten years ago. But she did write a book chronicling her time as a close advisor to the first lady just in case you wanted to learn more about her. As a teaser, she claimed, among other things, credit for glasnost and the historic summits between Reagan and Gorbachev that led to the end of the cold war. As a result Molly Ivens commented, “There the poor woman was, sitting in San Francisco with full accountability for world peace, and none of us even knew her name.” 
Jeff
I get what some folks are saying re wanting to rest up for the NCAA tournament. I get it that losing on Friday might even be a positive.
But I want to win on Friday. If we win that day, we get to play on CBS the next day. Appearing on that national network, with the same announcers who will call the Final Four, is a big deal that can only enhance the brand of our growing program.
Jim B.