Weekend of 3/15 Games Thread
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OrangeBlue98
- Des Moines, IA
It was funny - I sat next to an Iowa fan Sunday at Carver-Hawkeye. We were talking about how bad DJ Carstensen is and how he's good for at least two "WTF" calls a game. Who was the other guy this Iowa fan mentioned in that same conversation? Yep, Courtney Green.
Why couldn't one of the other conferences having a tournament this weekend taken those two guys off of our hands?
OrangeBlue98
- Des Moines, IA
(Warning - long post upcoming . . .)
There are two ways to look at this. One is to keep rotating between Chicago and Indy. I'm in the camp where the conference footprint has a lot of metro urban areas and NBA/NHL arenas so it's good to move things around. Here are a few caveats around that, in my opinion.
1) We don't alter our tournament dates to move earlier based on another conference. Yes, that removes Madison Square Garden since the Big East will always have MSG for its tournament. Oh well, the Barclays Center is available if we want to play in NYC again. You know they'd rather have our event than the A-10 or similar conference.
2) No domes for the Big Ten tournament - I'd rather have sold out arenas than 25,000 in a half-empty dome setup. The SEC tried using the old Georgia Dome a number of years ago for its basketball tournament. It looked like they were playing in a tomb.
3) All else equal, I'd prefer to keep the event off of either coast and have it more central. However, I recognize money talks and some place like the new Clippers arena will probably want to make a big splash and will bid big. I'll keep Portland and Seattle out of this mix for the time being, but they obviously have arenas capable of hosting an event like this.
4) The event has to be in a location close to the Big Ten footprint. So that rules out sites without a Big Ten team in the state like St. Louis, Las Vegas, or Denver.
So here are the locations with those caveats.
Chicago - United Center (post-Caitlin Clark, you could hold some of the the women's event at Wintrust Arena and have them at the same time)
Indianapolis - Gainbridge Fieldhouse (could use Hinkle Fieldhouse like Wintrust, which I honestly think would be pretty cool)
Minneapolis/St. Paul - Target Center and Xcel Energy Center (I believe that arena is strictly for hockey when it comes to sports, but I could be wrong about that)
Detroit - Little Caesars Arena
New York area - Barclays Center and Prudential Center (see Chicago and Indy above)
Milwaukee - Fiserv Forum (perhaps could use where UW-Milwaukee plays for some women's games)
Cleveland - Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse
Columbus - Nationwide Arena (where the Blue Jackets play, but I respect the opinion that some may not want to play in OSU's home city)
Philadelphia - Wells Fargo Center
Pittsburgh - PPG Paints Arena
LA - Crypto.com Arena and Intuit Dome (Clippers new arena) - you could use both like shown above for Chicago and Indy
Omaha - CHI Health Center (Creighton's home court - very nice facility that is hosting NCAA games this year)
I don't have a major issue with the women's tournament being split from the men's event and maybe being held in a slightly smaller arena. For example, Des Moines with its 16,000 seat arena that has hosted NCAA first weekend games would be a great location for the women's event. I want to see full arenas for as many games as possible. If you can have the events in the same town, great. But I feel like the women's event can be later in the week now as Big Ten women's teams have almost two weeks off between the end of the BTT and the start of the NCAA tournament.
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Sparty is going to have to make some shots to win. Sounds basic. But you can’t beat Purdue shooting 35% or whatever and missing open 3’s.
PizzaHutParkingLot
- McPherson, KS
Braden Smith down for Purdue
I'm court side and that did not look good
That’s terrible tough luck :/
OrangeBlue98
- Des Moines, IA
Somewhat positive sign - Smith is walking back to the Purdue locker room. If he couldn't put any weight on it, that would be a bad sign.
Loyer and Edey should both be T'd up
Edey will not get to play this way in the tournament. He is laying waste with no fouls at all.
madillini4
Ozamataz Buckshank
- Millywaukee
Big ten officiating doing their thing today I guess
Man Edey can sling his arms all over to push off. Just watch the last play.
OrangeBlue98
- Des Moines, IA
A lot of restraint from the officiating crew to not T up Sissoko on that reaction. He may very well have been correct, but you can't react like that.
I guess at least they called a technical on both Edey and Holloman, but Loyer threw a ball at an MSU player then Edey came over and pushed Holloman as Holloman stood his ground and basically told Edey to eff himself.
Interesting having Smith return to the bench. If he isn't 100% for the tourney that would be disastrous for Purdue
Goillinikobd
- Southeastern US
Maybe it’s just me but I can’t find it in me to like Eady, therefore I don’t appreciate his bball skills. To me, his top three skills are his height, his wing span and his weight.
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