Week of 1/12 Bracketology

Illinois a 4 seed in the Bracket Matrix
bracketmatrix.com

Illinois #10 in the NET Rankings

Per KenPom, we’re 7th overall now with
3rd best offense and 16th best defense.Only B1G teams ahead of us there (overall) are ScUM and Purdue.

Dan said:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2010721429596348919

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Missouri has to be climbing up in top wins...

Should start creeping into some people having us as a 3 seed or one of the highest 4s. Just keep winning.

Epsilon said:

Per KenPom, we’re 7th overall now with
3rd best offense and 16th best defense.Only B1G teams ahead of us there (overall) are ScUM and Purdue.

Illinois Continues Climb in KenPom Following Victory at Iowa

The Illini collected their fifth straight win Sunday, knocking off the Hawkeyes at home to continue inching up the KenPom rankings

www.si.com

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Around 12/15/2025, our Adj DRtg bottomed out at around 99.7 (points per 100 possessions allowed). Today we're at 96.7. Another 1 point improvement gives us the 12th-best defense and the 5th-best overall team on KP. A 2 point DRtg improvement would give us the 11th-best defense, a spot at #4 in KP, and an argument for a 1-seed, assuming we can get the wins to back it up.

Taking out the ol' Orange Tinted Glasses, if Illinois can go 2-1 against Purdue, MSU, and Michigan, and then pepper in 2 other losses (finish out the season 12-3), it seems like that would certainly put them on the 1/2 cut line and a B1G tournament title would almost certainly be a 1-seed.

Anxious for the updated @Fighter of the Nightman analysis.

RollChief said:

... Anxious for the updated @Fighter of the Nightman analysis.

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Bat Signal received!! Current resume is below, using the categories that the historic NET archives track ... leading me to believe they are the key factors the Committee is considering.

Overall Record: 13-3
NET Ranking: #10
Road Record: 3-0
vs. Quad 1: 4-3
vs. Quad 2: 2-0
vs. Quad 3: 0-0
vs. Quad 4: 7-0

And here are our updated results and upcoming games by Quad classification! Throwing in the rules for each so folks can see how close a given opponent could be to slipping.

Quad 1 | 4-3
Home #1-30, Neutral #1-50, Away #1-75
vs. #1 Michigan
at #5 Purdue
L 61-74 vs. #8 UConn (New York, NY)
at #11 Nebraska
L 80-83 vs. #11 Nebraska
at #14 Michigan State
L 86-90 vs. #17 Alabama (Chicago, IL)
W 81-77 vs. #19 Texas Tech
W 75-69 at #20 Iowa
W 75-62 vs. #27 Tennessee (Nashville, TN)
W 88-80 at #39 Ohio State
at #45 UCLA
at #46 USC

Quad 2 | 2-0
Home #31-75, Neutral #51-100, Away #76-135
vs. #34 Indiana
vs. #40 Wisconsin
vs. #56 Washington
W 91-48 vs. #76 Missouri (St. Louis, MO)
at #77 Northwestern
W 73-65 at #104 Penn State (Philadelphia, PA)

Quad 3 | 0-0
Home #76-160, Neutral #101-200, Away #135-240
vs. #77 Northwestern
vs. #83 Minnesota
vs. #102 Oregon
at #164 Maryland

Quad 4 | 7-0
Home #161+, Neutral #201+, Away #241+
vs. #164 Maryland
W 81-55 vs. #168 Rutgers
W 98-58 vs. #190 LIU
W 84-65 vs. #208 Colgate
W 87-73 vs. #210 UTRGV
W 113-70 vs. #221 FGCU
W 90-55 vs. #319 Southern
W 113-55 vs. #351 Jackson State

On teams jumping around...
- It would be nice for #34 Indiana to end up in the top 30 and give us a potential Quad 1 home win vs. the Hoosiers, but I am not seeing it. Knock on wood and all, but I am not impressed by them at all and find it very hard to believe that they'll end up in the top 30.
- Definitely root for the Mildcats to do well besides their two losses to us! At #77, they are super close to sneaking into the top 75, which would give us a Quad 1 and Quad 2 game against them rather than the current setup of Quad 2 and Quad 3. Given that we will play NU twice every single year, we always want them in the top 75.
- Similarly, it would be really nice for Maryland to at least sneak into the top 160 (currently #164). There is just no advantage in playing a Quad 4 Big Ten home game and especially a Quad 3 Big Ten road game ... especially when that team seems to have voodoo magic over us. We should beat Maryland easily both times, but if we are going to pick a random conference game to drop the ball ... it simply CANNOT be either game vs. the Terps.

On our remaining games...
- Simply avoiding Quad 3 and Quad 4 losses gets us to 18 wins already. We CANNOT drop these games, period. The NET Rankings aren't going to help us out by "masking" a random upset loss simply because the Big Ten usually has pretty good NET Rankings ... the bottom of the conference is terrible, and it's showing in these rankings. Need to sweep the remaining 5 Quad 3/Quad 4 games with absolutely zero excuses.
- By doing that, we are at 18-3 with no bad losses. I think for a top 3 seed, we also very clearly need to sweep the Quad 2 games. All of them are at home except for Northwestern, and that is our most favorable road game given the usual crowd makeup. If we sweep the Indiana/Wisconsin/Washington home games and win in Evanston, we are now at 22-3 with no bad losses and a very impressive 6-0 Quad 2 record. Now, we focus on the remaining Quad 1 opportunities.
- While we have a lot of opportunities for big wins and we should aim higher for this, I think we need to hold ourselves to the standard that we SHOULD go 2-0 on our West Coast trip. Neither UCLA nor especially USC has looked impressive this year, and neither home atmosphere is usually very intimidating. These are two Quad 1 opportunities that we just can't let slip through our fingers, IMO ... need both. If we win both of these, we are at 24-3 overall, 6 Quad 1 wins, 6 Quad 2 wins and zero bad losses. I honestly think even if we went 0-4 in the remaining Quad 1 games, we would be above the #4 seed line, assuming we can get one BTT win and be playing on Saturday.
- The final four Quad 1 games (vs. Michigan, at Purdue, at Nebraska and at MSU) will really define how elite of a seed we can get. Needless to say, the super optimistic scenario of sweeping these games almost certainly earns us a #1 seed, as we would only have 4-5 losses on Selection Sunday and the unambiguously hottest team in the country, lol. However, I think just taking one of them probably gives us a fair shot at a #2 seed and safely in #3 seed territory, as we would be 25-6 before the BTT starts, with 7 Quad 1 wins and 6 Quad 2 wins. That was why the Iowa win was so important ... ASSUMING NO SLIP-UPS, we are now playing with house money.

TL;DR

We are right on track for a really great seed. Our "status quo" has improved to taking care of business and remaining safely above the #4 seed line. The "more optimistic goal" is to start putting ourselves in the #2 seed conversation by continuing to win, and then you can dream big about a #1. There's a long way to go, but the win at Iowa yesterday was A LOT more important than even some here are making it out to be, with comments about Iowa likely not finishing the season ranked and stuff like that. We just beat a top 20 NET team on their home floor, and even an epic, epic collapse (which I don't envision) will keep them in the top 75 and therefore Quad 1. We are still undefeated on the road. And most importantly, we have now flat-out guaranteed a record of no worse than 4-9 in our Quad 1 games, and that assumes we just lie down and lose the rest ... which I guarantee you we will not.

Will keep this short: Illini are building another very solid resume before the heart of B1G season. A testament to the challenging schedule that Coach B has created year in and out. It is nice to be sitting in early January thinking about seeding compared to will the team make it to the Big Dance.

Composite rankings as of 1/12

Fighter of the Nightman said:

On teams jumping around...
- It would be nice for #34 Indiana to end up in the top 30 and give us a potential Quad 1 home win vs. the Hoosiers, but I am not seeing it. Knock on wood and all, but I am not impressed by them at all and find it very hard to believe that they'll end up in the top 30.
- Definitely root for the Mildcats to do well besides their two losses to us! At #77, they are super close to sneaking into the top 75, which would give us a Quad 1 and Quad 2 game against them rather than the current setup of Quad 2 and Quad 3. Given that we will play NU twice every single year, we always want them in the top 75.
- Similarly, it would be really nice for Maryland to at least sneak into the top 160 (currently #164). There is just no advantage in playing a Quad 4 Big Ten home game and especially a Quad 3 Big Ten road game ... especially when that team seems to have voodoo magic over us. We should beat Maryland easily both times, but if we are going to pick a random conference game to drop the ball ... it simply CANNOT be either game vs. the Terps.

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It will never not frustrate me that we get pigeon holed into a "rivalry" with Northwestern in all sports. I would much rather have guaranteed games against Iowa, Wisconsin...basically anyone else in the original Big Ten.

IlliniwekKDR said:

It will never not frustrate me that we get pigeon holed into a "rivalry" with Northwestern in all sports. I would much rather have guaranteed games against Iowa, Wisconsin...basically anyone else in the original Big Ten.

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I don’t mind it quite as much for football but for basketball it really should be Iowa. I’d take Purdue or Indiana for basketball in a heartbeat though. Wisky would certainly be an improvement over NU as well but we’ve had so many high stakes against Michigan State and ScUM in basketball that I’d love protected games against either or both of them too.

I think one prime question (pretty much every year when you're in this top 15-ish territory) is that if we have zero non-quad 1 losses, how many Q1 wins would it require to get on the 2 or 3 line?

If we stay above a 4 seed, I'd personally feel really good. 2 seed may be more difficult this year than years past simply due to the amount of great teams, but a fine goal to aim for.

Epsilon said:

I don’t mind it quite as much for football but for basketball it really should be Iowa. I’d take Purdue or Indiana for basketball in a heartbeat though. Wisky would certainly be an improvement over NU as well but we’ve had so many high stakes against Michigan State and ScUM in basketball that I’d love protected games against either or both of them too.

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The Iowa rivalry has been electric the past ten years or so with some other great games throughout history. And you can't tell me they care that much about Nebraska (well, maybe different this year)

I just cannot for the life of me understand how ANYONE considers NW a rivalry but not ClownPantsU. Indiana is THE rivalry. Maybe I am stuck in the 80's, but Henson vs. Knight was THE rivalry.

IlliniwekKDR said:

It will never not frustrate me that we get pigeon holed into a "rivalry" with Northwestern in all sports. I would much rather have guaranteed games against Iowa, Wisconsin...basically anyone else in the original Big Ten.

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Preach, brother! Iowa's football rivalries are shockingly "meh" on the hoops side of things vs. Wisconsin, Minnesota and Nebraska. And, as you noted, Illinois/Northwestern is even more forced and lame in basketball than it is in football. While at least Indiana and Purdue have each other, Illinois/Iowa as a protected rivalry in basketball is just too obvious, and it's nothing short of a shame that the league hasn't protected it already.

Epsilon said:

I don’t mind it quite as much for football but for basketball it really should be Iowa. I’d take Purdue or Indiana for basketball in a heartbeat though. Wisky would certainly be an improvement over NU as well but we’ve had so many high stakes against Michigan State and ScUM in basketball that I’d love protected games against either or both of them too.

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I think once you start entertaining protecting Illinois/Michigan or Illinois/MSU, you are risking having way too many protected rivalries ... those are pretty much just traditional Big Ten teams that we have history with and we've both been good lately, but there isn't some "deeper" rivalry element like with Iowa or Indiana. It is not balanced at all in football (e.g., Iowa has 3 protected rivalries out of 9 conference games, and PSU has ZERO), so I see no reason why it should be in basketball, either. These should be the protected rivalries, which gives no team more than 4 "static" conference games.

Illinois - Indiana and Iowa
Indiana - Illinois and Purdue
Iowa - Illinois and Nebraska
Maryland - N/A
Michigan - Michigan State and Ohio State
Michigan State - Michigan
Minnesota - Wisconsin
Nebraska - Iowa
Northwestern - N/A
Ohio State - Michigan
Oregon - Washington
Penn State - N/A
Purdue - Indiana
Rutgers - N/A
UCLA - USC
USC - UCLA
Washington - Oregon
Wisconsin - Minnesota

If we want to start chopping some, get rid of Iowa/Nebraska and Michigan/OSU, as they're more football rivalries anyway. I'm sure the geniuses at the Big Ten who make the schedules can figure it out, and it would make for better ratings and matchups over the long haul!

Fighter of the Nightman said:

I think once you start entertaining protecting Illinois/Michigan or Illinois/MSU, you are risking having way too many protected rivalries ... those are pretty much just traditional Big Ten teams that we have history with and we've both been good lately, but there isn't some "deeper" rivalry element like with Iowa or Indiana. It is not balanced at all in football (e.g., Iowa has 3 protected rivalries out of 9 conference games, and PSU has ZERO), so I see no reason why it should be in basketball, either. These should be the protected rivalries, which gives no team more than 4 "static" conference games.

Illinois - Indiana and Iowa
Indiana - Illinois and Purdue
Iowa - Illinois and Nebraska
Maryland - N/A
Michigan - Michigan State and Ohio State
Michigan State - Michigan
Minnesota - Wisconsin
Nebraska - Iowa
Northwestern - N/A
Ohio State - Michigan
Oregon - Washington
Penn State - N/A
Purdue - Indiana
Rutgers - N/A
UCLA - USC
USC - UCLA
Washington - Oregon
Wisconsin - Minnesota

If we want to start chopping some, get rid of Iowa/Nebraska and Michigan/OSU, as they're more football rivalries anyway. I'm sure the geniuses at the Big Ten who make the schedules can figure it out, and it would make for better ratings and matchups over the long haul!

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Northwestern- N/A

IlliniwekKDR said:

The Iowa rivalry has been electric the past ten years or so with some other great games throughout history. And you can't tell me they care that much about Nebraska (well, maybe different this year)

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I do think part of why we all like the Iowa rivalry is because we’ve won almost every time and when it’s been a key game on the schedule.

Not sure we’d feel the same if we were 3-7 against them.

Epsilon said:

Northwestern- N/A

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Serious question. Has anyone ever met a Northwestern fan?

IlliniwekKDR said:

Serious question. Has anyone ever met a Northwestern fan?

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Only when I’m literally in their basketball arena, and even then I’m around more Illini fans.

Since it's a quiet night in CBB, let's look at how the metrics bracket looks and has changed in the last 10 days.

Remember, 3 points:
1. The polls are meaningless. At least from a bracketing and quality perspective. They're useful for recruiting and media attention, but they hold no actual merit as to the quality of a team or where they'll be bracketed.
2. There are effectively two kinds of metrics: resume-based metrics and efficiency-based metrics. Resume-based metrics evaluate a team based on who they've played and beat. Their value is more in terms of how earned their spot is in an era of unbalanced conference schedules and wildly different non-conference schedules. Efficiency-based metrics evaluate a team based on how they've performed in each game. This is more predictive of how they'll perform going forward, and is more indicative of the actual quality of a team.
3. This is just for fun, and things will still change and teams will perform differently going forward to March, so a team that's in a position to get a 1 seed now may not be lined up for such at the actual tournament selection.

Auto bids: 31 auto bids, still early enough in the season that we'll just give it to the member that has the best NET rating. This results in:
B1G - Michigan (1)
B12 - Arizona (2)
ACC - Duke (4)
WCC - Gonzaga (6)
SEC - Vanderbilt (7)
BE - UConn (8)
MW - Utah State (13)
A10 - St. Louis (21)
MAC - Akron (48)
Southland - McNeese (52)
American - Tulsa (55)
MVC - Murray State (60)
BSth - High Point (78)
Ivy - Yale (79)
CAA - Hofstra (81)
WAC - Utah Valley (87)
CUSA - Liberty (93)
BW - Hawaii (94)
Summit - St. Thomas (116)
Horz - Wright State (121)
MAAC - Marist (123)
SoCon - Mercer (124)
SB - Troy (127)
BSky - Portland State (129)
ASun - Austin Peay (152)
OVC - UT Martin (165)
Patriot - Navy (184)
NEC - LIU (190)
AE - Vermont (202)
SWAC - Grambling (239)
MEAC - Howard (275)

At Large (37): I'll take the top 37 teams by average of resume metrics (SOR and WAB) that aren't already listed as an auto bid.
Nebraska, Iowa State, Purdue, BYU, Houston, Michigan State, Illinois, Clemson, North Carolina, Texas Tech, Alabama, Arkansas, Villanova, Seton Hall, Virginia, USC, UCF, Georgia, Auburn, Miami (OH), Kansas, St. Mary's, Miami FL, SMU, Oklahoma State, Florida, Louisville, Tennessee, George Mason, St. John's, New Mexico, Texas A&M, Iowa, MIssouri, Virginia Tech, Stanford, Ohio State

Just missed, don't have the resume: Indiana, NC State, LSU, California, SD State, TCU, UCLA, Kentucky, Baylor, Boise State, Syracuse, Oklahoma, Nevada, Creighton, Wisconsin, Arizona State, Butler, Colorado, Dayton, Wake Forest, Washington, Texas

Seeding, based on average NET, KenPom, and Torvik (change from last time in parenthesis, auto bids in bold)

1 (1). Michigan (+0)
2 (1). Arizona (+0)
3 (1). Vanderbilt (+3)
4 (1). Iowa State (+1)
5 (2). Purdue (-2)
6 (2). UConn (-2)
7 (2). Illinois (+3)
8 (2). Gonzaga (-1)
9 (3). Houston (-1)
10 (3). Duke (-1)
11 (3). Florida (+3)
12 (3). Alabama (-1)
13 (4). Michigan State (+4)
14 (4). BYU (-1)
15 (4). Virginia (+5)
16 (4). Louisville (-4)
17 (5). Tennessee (-2)
18 (5). Nebraska (+4)
19 (5). St. John's (+0)
20 (5). Kansas (-4)
21 (6). Iowa (-3)
22 (6). Utah State (+8)
23 (6). Texas Tech (-2)
24 (6). Clemson (+7)
25 (7). Villanova (+3)
26 (7). Arkansas (-2)
27 (7). North Carolina (-4)
28 (7). Georgia (-1)
29 (8). SMU (+8)
30 (8). Auburn (+3)
31 (8). St. Louis (+5)
32 (8). St. Mary's (-6)
33 (9). Miami FL (+2)
34 (9). Ohio State (+5)
35 (9). Texas A&M (NEW)
36 (9). Seton Hall (+5)
37 (10). UCF (+6)
38 (10). New Mexico (NEW)
39 (10). USC (-1)
40 (10). Akron (+4)
41 (11). Oklahoma State (NEW)
42 (11). Missouri (NEW)
43 (11*). Virginia Tech (+3)
44 (11). McNeese (+5)
45 (11*). Stanford (NEW)
46 (12). Tulsa (+1)
47 (12). Murray State (NEW)
48 (12*). George Mason (NEW)
49 (12*). Miami (OH) (NEW)
50 (12). High Point (+4)
51 (13). Yale (+0)
52 (13). Hofstra (NEW)
53 (13). Utah Valley (-3)
54 (13). Liberty (NEW)
55 (14). Hawaii (NEW)
56 (14). St. Thomas (+0)
57 (14). Wright State (+2)
58 (14). Marist (NEW)
59 (15). Mercer (NEW)
60 (15). Troy (NEW)
61 (15). Portland State (NEW)
62 (15). Austin Peay (NEW)
63 (16). UT Martin (+0)
64 (16). Navy (NEW)
65 (16*). LIU (+0)
66 (16*). Vermont (+0)
67 (16*). Grambling (+0)
68 (16*). Howard (+0)

Dropped out: Kentucky, UCLA, Baylor, LSU, Creighton, Butler, Oklahoma
First 4 out: Indiana, NC State, Kentucky, WIsconsin
Next 4 out: UCLA, LSU, Santa Clara, Creighton
Further out: Creighton, TCU, Texas, Baylor, Washington, San Diego State

Keep in mind, this is a snapshot of today's resume and efficiency metrics. Does that mean I think Kentucky and UCLA and Indiana would be left out if they made a bracket today? Probably not, but the resume metrics speak loudly for George Mason and Miami (OH), even if the efficiency metrics remind us that they are not actually very good teams.

Interesting tidbit:

Texas Tech is currently the highest ranked team that we’ve beat in NET (#19), but if you apply the road / neutral multiplier to each game, it’s our lowest rated Q1 win and @Iowa is our best win of the season.

Q1 is:

Top 30 at home
Top 50 on neutral (1.67x home)
Top 75 on the road (2.5x home)

Applying the multiplier, if each game were played at home, this is the NET ranking equivalent: (rounded up and down for simplicity)

8 Iowa
16 Tennessee
16 Ohio St
19 Texas Tech

lstewart53x3 said:

Interesting tidbit:

Texas Tech is currently the highest ranked team that we’ve beat in NET (#19), but if you apply the road / neutral multiplier to each game, it’s our lowest rated Q1 win and @Iowa is our best win of the season.

Q1 is:

Top 30 at home
Top 50 on neutral (1.67x home)
Top 75 on the road (2.5x home)

Applying the multiplier, if each game were played at home, this is the NET ranking equivalent: (rounded up and down for simplicity)

8 Iowa
16 Tennessee
16 Ohio St
19 Texas Tech

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great stuff as always... but you left out the juiciest of the wins. the coveted quad 1A win which I believe is a win at neutral site or on the road vs top 30 in the NET (we can expand that to kenpom or torvik as well).

mysterio2525 said:

great stuff as always... but you left out the juiciest of the wins. the coveted quad 1A win which I believe is a win at neutral site or on the road vs top 30 in the NET (we can expand that to kenpom or torvik as well).

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Yep, Q1A is:

Home: vs. NET Ranks 1-15.
Neutral: vs. NET Ranks 1-25.
Away: vs. NET Ranks 1-40.

We currently have 2.

#20 Iowa away (top 40)
#39 Ohio St away (top 40)

And:

#19 Texas Tech home (need top 15)
#27 Tennessee neutral (need top 25)

Are both close as well.

IlliniwekKDR said:

Serious question. Has anyone ever met a Northwestern fan?

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I actually did grad school there and still couldn’t care less about their sports teams.