College Basketball is here! As we kickoff the season, we are revealing our first power rankings and to make it more fun I made up conference win totals for every Big Ten Team. So starting from the bottom lets rank each program and predict whether they hit their over on win totals! Stick around for an announcement at the end of the article.
by Jordan Beckley
I mean how much of a joyride is College Basketball?
It was Day One (!) and we got a great battle for New Jersey game with Princeton beating Rutgers in Trenton to start the night. Then to finish it off we had preseason number 4 Michigan State lose at home to James Madison in overtime!!
On the opposite side you saw fans of Purdue, Illinois and Wisconsin feel like their team is invincible. All the while, Ohio State fans and Northwestern fans were left wondering if the players knew that these games counted.
It’s still too early to know who will have extremely long seasons and what fans will enjoy every moment of the regular season, but it isn’t too early to try and predict it.
Instead of just a normal power rankings to start the year, I decided to add the wrinkle of creating fake win totals for Big Ten play for each team.
Win Totals aren’t a thing in College Basketball with uneven schedules due to no standardization of non-conference scheduling. So, you won’t see these lines on FanDuel. These are strictly made up totals for the sake of this article based on the past history of teams in the approximate finish range.
I will touch on how I picked each number for each team, explain why they are ranked where they are and give out my win prediction. So let’s dive into the Floor Slap’s first annual Big Ten Basketball Tipoff Power Rankings with imaginary win totals!
14. Minnesota – O/U: 3.5 Big Ten Wins
The Gophers are universally being picked to finish last in the conference. Them being at 14 shouldn’t be surprising, but the win total being at 3.5 might be eye-raising.
Whether it’s the lack of real depth, terrible defense, or mistrust of Coach Ben Johnson, most Minnesota fans are bracing for a terrible year. Gopher faithful, I’m here to tell you that it might not be a winless Big Ten season!
Here are the win totals of the past 5 last place teams in the Big Ten:
- 4 wins – ’18-19 Northwestern
- 2 wins – ’19-20 Nebraska
- 3 wins – ’20-21 Nebraska
- 4 wins – ’21-22 Minnesota and Nebraska
- 2 wins – ’22-23 Minnesota
For the most part even the worst teams get about 3 wins. Remember it isn’t a guarantee that Minnesota is the worst team either! We know the worst team gets about 3 wins, but that could be Penn State or a mystery team. So we round up to 3.5 wins for Minnesota.
Odds would still probably be -130 on U/3.5 and -110 on O/3.5 and my official guess is under with 3 total wins.
13. Penn State – 5.5 Big Ten Wins
Penn State is going under a complete renovation with Mike Rhoades as the new coach. Predictably, most people believe that it will take some time to restore what Micah Shrewsberry did in Happy Valley.
The Nittany Lions looked good in their debut and the holdovers from Shrewsberry in Jameel Brown and Kanye Clary shined. Is there a path for this Penn State team to actually be good? Maybe.
The 2nd to last team finishes between 4-6 wins, but we aren’t sure that will be where Penn State finishes. I like a lot of the pieces for Coach Rhoades, but I’m not sure that all of them will add up to victories come Big Ten time. Official pick is slight under at 5 wins.
12. Nebraska – 7.5 Big Ten Wins
I am high on Nebraska and the potential for their positionless look. I see a pathway where it really hits and Nebraska is a double digit win team. I also see a version where the spare parts don’t all fit together or the talent isn’t high end enough to win against the best Big Ten teams.
I like Coach Hoiberg and Nebraska to go over. The Huskers won 6 of their last 8 conference games last season to finish with 9 wins and I think Hoiberg can finagle his way to at least 8 with this roster. Official total is 8 wins for scorekeeping.
11. Michigan – 9.5 Big Ten Wins
Now this get’s really hard.
Originally, I wanted to release this a week before the first games, but I got busy with the scale of our CBB preview. Now, I have seen all these middle teams play one game against (largely) cupcakes and I have a bias.
One of the big surprises is that Michigan looks good. I mean potentially really good. Dug McDaniel (22pts, 8asts) and Olivier Nkamhoua (25pts, 7reb) looked like All-Big Ten dudes and supporting players like Terrance Williams, Will Tschetter and Nimari Burnett were also better than expected.
I am keeping them in my power rankings at 11 and acting like I didn’t see any games, but I am picking the over at 10 total wins and that might be too low.
10. Rutgers – 9.5 Big Ten Wins
If you want to talk about bias after seeing a game, Rutgers is a great example of how it can negatively effect them.
It is hard to feel good about Rutgers after they sputtered out in a loss to Princeton in the opener. Still, Mawot Mag didn’t play, Princeton was a Sweet Sixteen team last year and it was a neutral site game. Most teams beat up cupcakes or scraped by them. Should we really punish a less than 100% Scarlet Knights team for sheduling a good game on Day 1?
Maybe a little bit. My week 1 observations article will come soon, but I’m concerned that it seemed like Steve Pikiell (just like us) doesn’t know who his best 5 is yet. Their roster was stripped a bit by Cam Spencer and Paul Mulcahy’s surprise departures, and the offense from the foreign tour didn’t translate.
I am picking Rutgers to finish at 8 wins a 1.5 game under.
9. Ohio State – 9.5 Big Ten Wins
Alright as we approach the middle of the table this is where I explain that there are 140 total Big Ten games and therefore can only be 140 total wins to divvy between the 14 teams.
That matters when picking between the mess of teams at 9.5/10.5 wins. Part of me wants to pick overs for all the middle teams because its the beginning of the year, everyone is healthy and optimism is at an all time high.
But, I have to pick some unders for the math to math. The last 5 years we have had 6-10 teams finish with double digit wins. So we have 11 teams at 9.5 win totals or above.
For there to be a bunch of 10 win teams it means that the top can’t be dominant. Purdue might be, but I don’t think Michigan State, Maryland or Illinois are the tier of teams to knock the 7-10th place teams to below .500. Which means there will be closer to 10 teams at 10 wins than 6 teams.
I’m optimistic for the Buckeyes and are going over at 10 wins. I like the Sophomores to step up, the freshman to figure it out and Holtmann to coach for his job.
8. Northwestern – 10.5 Big Ten Wins
I believe Northwestern is due for regression this year, but not by much. That will place the Wildcats at 8th in the power rankings and down 1.5 wins at 10.5 win total. Not that extreme.
I think I have seen enough of Brooks Barnhizer in preseason and their opener to know that their will be somebody to fill in for Chase Audige. Boo Buie is still fantastic. The defense will always be there.
Northwestern scraps and claws to 11 wins (over) and another tournament appearance.
7. Iowa – 10.5 Big Ten Wins
All of the teams in the middle could start with “I like this team…” as I really do like something about all the teams in the middle of the Big Ten. It’s what I don’t like that can hurt the teams and cause them to be unders.
Fran McCaffery is relying on a lot of youth this season. Sophomore Dasonte Bowen is starting, another Sophomore Josh Dix will have a big role off the bench, four freshmen Pryce Sandfort, Owen Freeman, Brock Harding and Ladji Dembele all got big minutes in their opener. Beyond the youth, the upperclassmen leaders in Payton Sandfort and Patrick McCaffery haven’t proven themselves as the guys yet.
Payton Sandfort looked awesome in his debut (21pts, 9reb) and I picked him to be All-Big Ten. Still, him Tony Perkins, and Ben Krikke aren’t enough for me not to lean towards the negative. This year could get away from the Hawkeyes but they should be a wagon next year when all the young players have a season under their belt.
Under 10.5 with 10 wins.
6. Indiana – 10.5 Big Ten Wins
Again, I have to find somebody to go under with.
Indiana’s first impression is impacting this. The Hoosiers lacked creation in the halfcourt playing the big lineup of Kel’el Ware, Mackenzie Mgbako and Malik Reneau. Trey Galloway was forced to do a lot and as much as people love Galloway, are Hoosier fans thrilled they needed him to score 16 points and take 9 shots to beat FGCU at home?
The Hoosiers defense will be close to if not the best defense all year because of that all-limbs lineup. Coach Woodson will have tougher decisions than he’s had to make as a coach this season balancing the strengths and weaknesses of different looks.
Whether they go offense or defense I think Indiana is closer to the middle of the Big Ten than they are to the top group. Slight under at 10 wins.
5. Wisconsin – 10.5 Big Ten Wins
Wisconsin is tough. Their over/under feels like it should be higher with how much they bring back, but that same core also only won 9 games last year. Tyler Wahl, Chucky Hepburn, and Steven Crowl are fine, but not world beaters.
The Badgers ceiling will be reached by transfer AJ Storr making a big impression and Connor Essegian making a leap in his second stint.
Wisconsin missed out on a little bit of late game luck last year and I think that will make them bounce back for an over. Still, it is only a slight over at 11 wins as I think that the Badgers will struggle away from the Kohl Center against the Big Ten’s best.
4. Maryland – 12.5 Big Ten Wins
Maryland is picked to finish 3rd in the preseason poll. There is a lot to like between the return of Jahmir Young and Julian Reese combo, Year 2 of Willard in College Park, a highly touted Freshman class and a couple key transfers.
The argument against the Terps is that Maryland was awful in away games last year and that the experienced players who won 11 Big Ten games last year were replaced by young unproven players.
I don’t think Maryland has the ceiling of Illinois, Purdue or Michigan State, but I do think they have a higher floor than the teams below them. I have them beating this win total at 13 wins with more room to go above 12.5 than they would fall below it.
3. Illinois – 12.5 Big Ten Wins
I want to put Illinois higher. Clearly it seems that after Game 1 we should consider the Illini the 2nd best team in the conference. I will stick with the pre-JMU upset and Tipoff ranking of them being 3rd as it probably is still true that their ceiling is lower than MSU.
Terrence Shannon Jr. is incredible. Dra Gibbs-Lawhorn will be a wildcard allseason and could really break out. The playmaking/assist numbers are still a major question. Their defense will prevent them from being below 10 wins.
However, every win after 10 wins represents a road win. If you give Brad Underwood 3 road wins over bad teams and one over a good one then subtract 1 loss at home to one of the better Big Ten teams that lands you at 12.
How many road wins is Illinois going to get against the middle of the Big Ten? Maybe a lot. 4-6 on the road is more likely than 6-4. Big Ten road wins are extremely difficult. I will go with 13 wins for now and an over.
2. Michigan State – 13.5 Big Ten Wins
The Spartans blurb would have looked a lot different a week ago!
The worst nightmare of what could go wrong for MSU played out in their first game against James Madison. AJ Hoggard couldn’t shoot (2-11 FG) and was left completely alone on drives. Malik Hall actually played as bad (2-12 FG) as Spartan fans make him out to be. None of the bigs were effective and as a team the Spartans shot 1-20 from three.
All that and it still took overtime for a predicted conference champion to beat the Spartans.
Spin zone for the Izzone is that they literally can’t shoot worse than they did, Jaxon Kohler is out with injury, and all the freshmen will only get better including Coen Carr who earned 28 minutes and scored 14 points in his somehow raw debut.
Michigan State will not have Jaden Akins, Hall and Hoggard go 6-33 from the field ever again. The ceiling is still extremely high for the Spartans and by the time the new year begins and the meat of the Big Ten schedule starts, they should be one of the conference’s best. However, we did just witness in this game and the loss in the exhibition to Tennessee in the Breslin Center that their floor might be lower than anticipated.
Their win total will be 1 higher than Maryland and Illinois. I have them dropping some games in Big Ten play to try and get Carr, Xavier Booker and other young players ready for March. My vote is under with 13 wins and a three way tie at 2nd place.
1. Purdue – 14.5 Big Ten Wins
Last year, the Boilermakers were head and shoulders above the rest of the conference and won it by three games. Even though Zach Edey and Purdue dominated the standings, it was a rough landing to get to 15 wins last season.
One point to take from this Win Totals piece is whether it is Mackey Arena, Assembly Hall, Kohl Center, Breslin Center, or the Crisler Center there are no shortage of difficult places to play in the Big Ten. That list didn’t even include Pinnacle Bank Arena, Jersey Mike’s Arena, Xfinity Center or Ryan-Welsh Arena which were all terrible locations for road teams. 18 win Big Ten seasons just aren’t feasible.
The debut for the Boilers was fairly promising all around. Bench guys showed potential, Starters showed improvement, and Zach Edey was effortlessly impactful. Hardcore fans probably found some concerns with the turnovers, difficulty with the press, Ethan Morton existing and yet Purdue set a school record for a lead at halftime.
I have the Boilers as Tipoff champs and winning 15 games (O/14.5) to do so. Tally all that up and you get the below predicted final standings:
| Team | Win Total | My prediction | Place |
| Purdue | 14.5 | 15 | 1st |
| Michigan St | 13.5 | 13 | T-2nd |
| Illinois | 12.5 | 13 | T-2nd |
| Maryland | 12.5 | 13 | T-2nd |
| Wisconsin | 10.5 | 11 | T-5th |
| Northwestern | 10.5 | 11 | T-5th |
| Michigan | 9.5 | 10 | T-7th |
| Indiana | 10.5 | 10 | T-7th |
| Iowa | 10.5 | 10 | T-7th |
| Ohio State | 9.5 | 10 | T-7th |
| Rutgers | 9.5 | 8 | T-11th |
| Nebraska | 7.5 | 8 | T-11th |
| Penn State | 5.5 | 5 | 13th |
| Minnesota | 3.5 | 3 | 14th |
** Announcement Time **
Thanks for reading my imaginary win totals and power rankings article. Make sure you come back next Thursday for the launch of my weekly CBB column:
Midweek Madness will be released every Thursday and it will feature several recurring segments.
- The ISO: I clear out and go 1 on 1 with the spotlight team of the week
- The Big 3: I talk about three things I noticed in the world of CBB that week
- Good Game Bad Game: I’ll let you guess on this one
- Weekend Wagers: I highlight my favorite bets for the Big Games of the weekend
- No Explanation Power Rankings
- And even more!
Please follow us @thefloorslap on X and bookmark our website to not miss a moment of CBB Madness all year!