You're either with us, or you don't watch hoops and you're against us

Editor's note: This post was thought out and mostly written prior to the ghastly first half that we are seeing on tv right now

So we've got a situation here. After Sparty's big win on Saturday night I got ridiculed by a couple of people for congratulating the Big 10 in what they considered a "down" season. Since I have watched a gazillion hours of hoops since around Election Day and since I actually follow the game while others are busy focusing on dopey politicians or their radio show, I actually understand that the Big 10 had a pretty good year. But before I get started at proving myself correct, let's review the following Facebook exchange:

TR is tired of people who don't follow hoops telling him that the BT is having a down year- go Sparty, Go Lions, Go Badgers!

RS: I will be the first to admit that, living in KC, I am better prepared to discuss the Big 12 than the Big 10. However, numbers still don't lie. Two teams in the top 25. Illinois loses to WKU, OSU loses to Siena, and the one good team in the conference gets to the finals.

By that logic, you're going to tell me that the Pac 10 is a great football conference even though USC is the only solid team they've fielded in five years...

JJH: I am sick of people who live and die by the numbers. Watch some fucking games! (JJH later admitted he was drunk and has no idea what point he was trying to prove)

RS: I suppose this would be the wrong time to mention that the Big 10 has never won the Big 10/ACC Challenge? That they're a big fat 0-10?

In the last ten years, the Big 10 has had one national champion and averages just under one team in the Final Four per year. If we look at the last five years, that's zero champions and four teams in the Final ... (and two of those were back in 2005). In three of the last six years, the Big 10 has not been represented at all.

Unless this is third grade and everyone gets a medal, winning and losing is all that matters. Is there something intrinsic about the Big 10 (other than regional bias) that I'm missing here? Or is the "uniqueness" of the Big 10 really just another word for mediocrity?


Ok, all caught up?

Since the Supervisor brought up the last 10 years- even though my point was this season (nothing like ignoring a comment to enhance your side) lets go with the Final Four fields between 2000 and 2009. I've decided to break them down in appearances, schools who made the final 4, championship losses, and championships. Lets look at how we did:


SEC: 4 appearances, 2 schools, 1 loss, 2 titles
PAC Ten: 4/2/2/0
Big Twelve: 6 appearances, 4 schools, 1 loss, 1 title
ACC: 9 appearances, 4 teams, 1 or 2 losses, 3 or 4 titles
BIG Ten: 8 appearances, 5 schools, 2/3 losses, 1/2 wins
CUSA: 3 appearances (MU and Lville were in CUSA for their Final 4 births) 3 schools, 1 loss, no titles
Big East: 5 appearances, 4 schools, no losses, 2 titles.

Yes, once again the RS wanted to use the last 10 years of data to prove a point about the Big 10- that point must be that the Big 10 is on par with every top conference in America. Even if we give the Lville and Marq appearances to the Big East the conference would still trail in appearances and title game losses and have a whopping one more title than the Big 10. To be honest, looking at their numbers, especially with 16 teams, the Big East is the conference that has certainly been overrated over the past decade.

Also, look at the number of schools that have made it. Out of the 11 members of the Big 10, 5 have gone to the Final 4 in the past decade. Only the Big East, with their 16 teams can beat that number. In addition, should we take this data back another 10 years we would be able to add 2 more schools who made it to the final weekend. My argument in favor of the Big 10 this season is that the conference is as deep as any in the country- the fact that almost half their members have made it to the Final 4 in the last decade shows that the top to bottom quality of this conference can not be matched.

Again, the original argument before the RS decided to turn his guns on himself was this season. So lets look at this season.

First off, the Big 10 was ranked either 2nd or 3rd in the RPI all season. The NCAA basketball committee also chose to put 7 teams in the tournament- the same number of teams as the ACC and Big East (the other two conferences ranked in the top 3 of the RPI all season). Those 7 spots were well-deserved. Lets look at the season, what two things do the following teams all have in common?

Butler
Florida State (2)
Texas
UCLA
Duke
Boston College
Washington
Kansas (2)
Louisville (2)
UConn
Mizzou

Each of those teams wore white on the first day of the NCAA tournament and each were defeated by a Big 10 program sometime this year. That is a pretty good list of scalps and would have looked even better had Notre Dame and Davidson not completely wet the bed all season.

The RS also brings up the Big 10-ACC challenge. So let's look at that event this season: The ACC demolished the Big 10 6-5 in the challenge. But those were not the only 11 games between the two conferences this year (there is one tonight, I hear). Maryland also beat MSU, Duke and Michigan split two games, Purdue beat BC. With all of that the breakdown would end up at 8-7 to the ACC, ah but the Big 10 are 2-0 in the tournament giving the midwesterners are 9 to 8 lead going into tonight.

Speaking of the tournament, lets use another control to compare the three conferences that got 7 teams in. Lets see how the schools did compared to their seeds. Did teams underachieve, overachieve, or just achieve what they were slated to do based on their seed. Ths should be fun (parenthesis will mean by how many rounds).

Big East:

Lville: Under
Pitt: Under
Villanova: Over (2)
W Virginia: Under
UConn: Achieved
Syracuse: Achieved
Marquette: Achieved

ACC:

Duke: Under
UNC: Over (1-2)
Wake: Under (2)
BC: Under
FSU: Under*
Clemson: Under*
Maryland: Over

*To a Big 10 team

BIG 10:

MSU: over (2)
Purdue: Over
Illinois: Under
OSU: Under
MIchigan: Over
Wisconsin: Over
Minn: Achieved

The Big 10 schools had a pretty good tournament here. These results show that the conference is not top-heavy, instead it is a deep conference. While you can scoff all you want, lets also keep in mind that both Penn State and Northwestern- two of the non-tourney teams won at Michigan State this year. Penn State also won the NIT in a field that included Kentucky, Creighton, Notre Dame, and ESPN's own St. Mary's.

Sure I could go on- I could bring up academic standards, the problems with recruiting warm weather kids to the upper midwest, and I could even add 5 teams to the conference in order to equal the monstrosity that is the Big East. But my point is more than made. The Big 10 in 2008-2009 is a deep conference, one that has good teams and great teams. A conference with some incredible scalps this season and one that has had a good last few weeks in this tournament.

With so many good players returning, the best is yet to come for the Big 10.