Big Ten Tournament Championship Preview

By:Paul Scofield

The Big Ten Tournament. That should say enough about it, one of the big power conferences in many sports, and basketball is no exception. When someone brought it up to me a couple weeks ago, there were 3 teams I mentioned in our conversation as “teams to watch out for” and one team that I said were heavy favorites. My 3 teams to watch out for were Purdue, Michigan and Penn State. My heavy favorite was Michigan State. Well when you look back at what’s unfolded in the tournament leading up to the championship game, I wasn’t necessarily wrong about Penn State. They overtook Ohio State for a third time this season. They ended up falling to Purdue in the semifinals. Michigan State ended up falling in the semifinals to Michigan. Which leaves us with 2 of my 3 teams to watch out for to battle it out in the championship game, Purdue and Michigan

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Michigan’s run to the title game came with wins against Iowa, Nebraska and Michigan State in a less than 48 hour timeframe. They’re looking to become the 1st team in 7 years to be repeat champions in the B1G tournament. They’ve had 4 players to score double figures in each of the tournament games thus far. Can they keep their momentum going into the game against Purdue?
The Boilermakers have only won 1 Big Ten title, back in 2009. They’ve beaten Michigan twice this season in close wins of 70-69 and 92-88. Michigan allows a Big Ten best, and 8th best in the nation 63.3 ppg. Can the Boilermakers break that average for a third time this season? Rebounding and turning that into 2nd chance points is going to be a big factor for them if they want to win their 2nd B1G title.
My pick is Purdue. Although I love Michigan, I think Purdue is too big for Michigan and they drop a 3rd game to them on the season. 74-69 Purdue.