Relevant NET updates of Illini opponents today. Wins are listed first, and then they are listed in order of how
unlikely they are to drop down to the next Quadrant. Just under the heading, I put a reminder of what qualifies for each category ... mostly to help me as I typed this!
Quad 1
H: #1-30, N: #1-50, A: #1-75
W vs. #4 UCLA (Las Vegas, NV)
W vs. #10 Texas (New York, NY)
W at #74 Wisconsin
L at #20 Maryland
L at #28 Indiana
L at #33 Iowa
L at #41 Northwestern
L vs. #29 Virginia (Las Vegas, NV)
L at #60 Penn State
L at #64 Ohio State
L vs. #28 Indiana
L vs. #49 Missouri (St. Louis, MO)
at #5 Purdue
Quad 2
H: #31-75, N: #51-100, A: #76-135
W vs. #31 Michigan State
W vs. #32 Rutgers
W vs. #41 Northwestern
W at #94 Nebraska
W vs. #64 Ohio State
W vs. #74 Wisconsin
L vs. #60 Penn State
vs. #55 Michigan
Results Close to Moving
- If Wisconsin drops TWO spots, we will lose both a Quad 1 and a Quad 2 win. Simply put, Wisconsin dropping out of the top 75 is a dagger to our resume.
- Similarly, it would be SO nice to have Rutgers and MSU sneak back into the top 30. The difference between (A) 3-9 in Quad 1 and 6-1 in Quad 2 and (B) 5-9 in Quad 1 and 4-1 in Quad 2 is actually pretty huge.
- On the more pessimistic side but not quite as important, it would be really nice to keep Indiana in the top 30 and Mizzou in the top 50 so that we could avoid those home/neutral losses slipping into Quad 2...
More Notes
- Making this was a bummer ... I'll never stop supporting this team, but losses at Iowa, Indiana, Maryland and vs. Virginia were SO close to being marquee wins. None of that is to even mention the frustration in just not showing up in Evanston or Columbus to what should have been relatively easy Quad 1 wins with better effort (yes, I count the game in Evanston as a "should have won" ... they had not hit their stride yet, and we played awfully in the second half).
- Neither potential loss left in our regular season will be a "bad" loss to the Committee ... we simply will not have one of those on Selection Sunday unless we somehow get it in the BTT. Losses here are perhaps even worse at this point given our resume - they're lost OPPORTUNITIES.
- With all of that said, we have two massive opportunities this week. Beat Michigan and lose to Purdue, and we at least take a positive (albeit small) step forward RE: seeding and we can see what happens in Chicago! Win both, and our resume is totally remade ... not even being dramatic.
Rooting Interests ... From What I Can Tell
- WISCONSIN! The Badgers finish vs. Purdue and at Minnesota. Neither Minnesota win means jack for our resume, and Purdue will be Quad 1 no matter what. I am not worried about our game in West Lafayette being different depending on their result in Madison tomorrow ... if we show up, we'll have a chance, and if we don't, we won't. Period. We REALLY need Wisconsin to stay in the top 75, and that at least requires going 1-1 this week. Going 2-0 would definitely do the trick.
- Rutgers ... RU finishes at Minnesota and vs. Northwestern, and 2-0 is not unrealistic. Again, Minnesota doesn't matter and our NU losses are going to stay right where they are regardless, so root for Rutgers in both! We need RU to jump from #32 to #30 to give us another Quad 1 win, and they can definitely achieve that this week.
- Michigan State ... MSU finishes with OSU at home, and we need them to win to jump from #31 to #30 to give us another Quad 1 win. Our road win at Nebraska is staying put as Quad 2, and for some reason the computers love OSU so they have a good shot of staying top 75; so, root for Sparty!
- Indiana ... BLECH, but it's true. If they drop below #30 (they're #28 right now) after a home loss to Michigan, we'd have another Quad 2 loss. Additionally, who the hell wants Juwan and Hunter Dickhead to make the NCAAs and possibly squeak into the Second Weekend
again if we possibly don't?! That's nightmare fuel for me.
IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ ALL THAT
- I'm not sure
just how much the Selection Committee uses all these numbers vs. more intangible things like the eye test and bracket matchup logistics, but there are quite a few things outlined above that are REALLY close to breaking either in our favor or against us if a few teams move up/down the rankings. On that note...
- It's crazy, but we could get THREE more Quad 1 wins this week with an upset in West Lafayette and some very realistic results going our way in other games. This week is huge. Obviously, the main focus is on us, as we control our own destiny - we have two chances for good wins this week, with one being a potential resume DEFINER. On
that note...
- If we can beat UCLA (actually our best win, according to the Committee) and Texas, we can beat Purdue. Even in Mackey. They lost to Rutgers at home, they only beat a (terrible-on-the-road) Maryland team by 3 at home and they just got outplayed for 40 minutes by Indiana at home. We will
obviously need to bring our A-game, and we all know consistency is this team's biggest enemy ... but it has to lift our spirits a bit to even know that our A-game
could win a game like this, right?!
To sum up, it all starts with obviously getting at least one win this week and hopefully two. After that, though, some movement in the NET Rankings could very significantly impact how our resume looks. Come Monday (Parotheads??), our Quad 1 record could be anywhere from 2-10 to 6-9 depending on our results and movement in the rankings. This week, needless to say, very well could define what this team's ceiling ends up being.
