The NCAA Tournament is put up or shut up time. All year we hear about teams and conferences, and then March Madness comes and separates the pretenders from the contenders.
This year, there’s been a lot of talk — from people not named Charles Barkley — about the Big Ten being the best conference in basketball. Seven teams from the Old Conference made it to the Big Dance, and so far they’re represented the league well. The Big Ten’s record after the round of 64 is 6-1, with the only hiccup being Wisconsin’s dismal performance against Mississippi in a game where the Badgers simply could not put the ball into the basket. The Big Ten’s top-seeded teams, Indiana and Ohio State, both won by wide margins, Michigan State and Michigan played well in convincing wins, Illinois survived some poor shooting to beat Colorado, and Minnesota spanked UCLA in a surprising upset. Other conferences that were touted prior to the tournament, such as the Big East and the Mountain West, did not fare so well during the first round of play.
The great thing about the NCAA Tournament, of course, is that everything can turn on a dime. All of these Big Ten teams could lose their next game — and if that happens the conference will be viewed as an overrated paper tiger. For now, the Big Ten has 6 teams in the round of 32, and that’s not bad.
Over the past few days, the top three teams in the conference — Indiana, Michigan State, and Michigan — all have lost. Ohio State’s victory over Michigan State on Sunday wasn’t that much of an upset, but Minnesota’s win over top-ranked Indiana last night was a real surprise, and Penn State’s victory tonight over Michigan, in a game in which Michigan frittered away a double-digit lead, is an absolute shocker. Before that game, Penn State hadn’t won a conference game all year. As a result of the upsets, Indiana leads the conference race with three losses, Michigan State and steady Wisconsin are right behind with four losses, and Ohio State and stumbling Michigan are one game farther back.
The added interest comes from the game’s location. 
Well, okay — that may be an overstatement, but the Buck Back is a lot of fun. Just recruit seven friends who like college basketball and don’t take things too seriously, ask everybody kick 8 bucks into the kitty, and then have a serpentine draft of all of the teams on the 64 lines of the NCAA Tournament grid. The eight players will end up with eight teams (we don’t count the four play-in games). Each time one of your teams wins a tournament game you get a buck back — hence the pool’s name.
For teams like Ohio State, the Big Ten Tournament is a different challenge entirely. The Buckeyes clearly are NCAA-bound — and they also are banged up. I hope Coach Thad Matta gives Aaron Craft, Jared Sullinger, and Deshaun Thomas as much rest as possible, and allows Amir Williams, Jordan Sibert, LaQuinton Ross, and others to play meaningful minutes in a tournament setting. In the NCAA Tournament, you never know when an injury or foul trouble might require you to go deeply into your bench. Why not give those team members some playing time in Big Ten Tournament games to get them ready?
Not every school is like that. I realized that when Richard went to Northwestern and I started following the Wildcats. NU has long had the reputation for being the toughest school, academically, in the Big Ten and the easiest, athletically, for the other schools to trounce. Northwestern students may have been the first to come up with the “you’ll be working for us one day” chant directed at opposing teams.
Last night I watched Illinois play Michigan State. It promised to be a tough game between two teams fighting for the Big Ten lead — but it became 
The game is part of the Big Ten/ACC Challenge, the annual event that until recently hasn’t been much of a challenge for the ACC. The 
Such early games make college basketball a lot of fun. It’s great to see the powerhouses play each other, and unlike college football, an early season loss isn’t fatal to your chances to win it all. In the meantime, you get a rough sense of how your team matches up and how far they have to go. Ohio State and Florida have developed a pretty good basketball rivalry recently, and last year’s game, in which the Buckeyes beat the Gators at Florida, helped to show that the 2010-2011 team was going to be special.
I thought Ohio State was one of the best teams in the country last year, and though they’ve lost a lot — David Lighty, Jon Diebler, and Dallas Lauderdale were crucial parts of the rotation — they kept a lot, too. Jared Sullinger is a year older and, from the pictures I’ve seen, a lot lighter, too. He’s supposedly been working on his outside game to go with his excellent inside game, and if he’s developed a solid outside shot he should be close to unstoppable. Silky smooth William Buford, who wisely decided to nix the NBA draft — especially wise, in view of the NBA strike — will be looking to wash the bad taste of last year’s last game out of his mouth. I’ll be particularly interested in seeing how pesky defender Aaron Craft, who quickly became the OSU player opposing fans most love to hate, has developed his game in the off season. And what about Deshaun Thomas — who at times was a scoring machine and seemed to have almost intuitive rebounding skills? Has he been working on his defense?
Some people like Dick Vitale, some people like Bill Raftery, some people like Jay Bilas — but for my money no announcer is so perfectly matched to a sport as Gus Johnson is to college basketball. He is knowledgeable, and professional, but what really makes him great is that he gets as pumped about the great games, the great plays, and the great finishes as everyday fans do. Listening to Gus Johnson call a game, his voice rising as the adrenalin surges, always makes that game more exciting and memorable.
