Typical homes for the Big Ten Tournament rest in the Midwest. Chicago and Indianapolis have held the postseason gathering every year since its inception in 1998. The United Center in Chicago was home for the tournament in its first four years. The location volleyed between the two cities afterward, before anchoring in Indianapolis for four years, then again sharing turns.
The locations meant most of the conference did not have significant travel ahead after playing out the regular season. That has changed this season, as everyone in the conference — except its newest member — has to hop on a plane to attend the Big Ten Conference Tournament at Verizon Center, which begins Wednesday.
Maryland will be arriving by bus. Other teams will be taking a flight the day before they play. Top-seeded Purdue, which has a double-bye, expects to arrive Thursday for its noon tipoff on Friday. The third-seeded Terrapins don’t play until Friday night in a tournament the coaches around the league contend is up for grabs.
“I think the tournament is wide open, more so than it’s ever been,” Michigan State’s Tom Izzo said on a conference call.
It is a curious lot. Just three of the conference’s 14 teams are below .500 for the season. Power names like Indiana, Michigan State and Ohio State linger below the middle of the conference. At the top, 13th-ranked Purdue, 24th-ranked Wisconsin and 25th-ranked Maryland are the only teams in the Associated Press top 25. That trio makes up the lone conference stalwarts in the poll this season. Others, like Northwestern, have popped in and out of the rankings.
“I’ve been in this league 30-something years and what we have in the Big Ten Tournament… go ahead, you’d rather play No. 12 rather than No. 7?” Izzo said. “It is wide open.”
Purdue has shifted from the strict reliance on heft it used a season ago. Its guard play is much better and Caleb Swanigan has become one the country’s best forwards, blossoming into the player expected last season. His year-over-year surges has been significant. Swanigan is shooting 44.9 percent from behind the 3-point line (up from 29.2) plus averages 12.6 rebounds per game (up from 8.3). He’s on the ballot for the Wooden Award, which goes to the best college player in the land.
“We’re better offensively,” Purdue coach Matt Painter said. “We’re a better shooting team. We were so big last year, but we were also rigid. Certain things bothered us. Going against a zone, we weren’t fluid. Getting pressed, we just didn’t have enough decision-makers and ball-handlers for a long period of time.”
Chasing the Boilermakers are the second-seeded Badgers, third-seeded Terrapins and fourth-seeded Minnesota. In that group, only Minnesota beat Purdue during conference play, and it needed overtime to do it. Maryland lost at home to the Boilermakers by a point. The Terrapins did not make a field goal in the last 7 ½ minutes — scoring 14 points from the free throw line — during Purdue’s Feb. 4 rally in Xfinity Center. Maryland point guard Melo Trimble was just 4-for-15 from the field that day.
As Izzo said, there are other challengers lurking. Iowa finished 10-8 in the conference, but has won four consecutive games. Among those were wins at Maryland and at Wisconsin. The Hawkeyes play Indiana in an intriguing opening game for both schools.
“Certainly in the last week, we’ve played a lot better and grown up a lot,” Iowa coach Fran McCaffrey said.
“We’re going to be playing one of the most dangerous teams, not only in the league, but in the country,” Indiana coach Tom Crean said.
Izzo used Indiana’s plight to bolster his argument about depth and parity in the conference. Of the Hoosiers’ 11 conference losses, six were by six points or fewer. Also, Michigan State, forever an issue in the conference, is the No. 5 seed. Just behind them are the dreamers of the lot: Northwestern. The Wildcats have never made the NCAA Tournament. They seem a lock for an at-large bid this season, but a couple wins in Washington would help assure that.
The tournament starts Wednesday at 4:30 when No. 13 Penn State plays No. 12 Nebraska. Rutgers, the 14 seed, plays No. 11 Ohio State at 7 p.m.
Maryland does not play until approximately 9 p.m. on Friday, in what is expected to be a pro-Terrapins Verizon Center at that point.
“If it’s in Chicago and Illinois is in the final, it’s an orangefest,” Izzo said. “If it’s in Indianapolis, and Purdue or Indiana is in the final, it’s that way for them. The difference is, our fans can get to those places a lot easier. That’s a benefit for Maryland, but there’s benefits everywhere you play. It’s a little more unique. [But] that’s not going to determine the game this time of year.”
• Todd Dybas can be reached at tdybas@washingtontimes.com.
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