Year in and year out, it seems as though the Big Ten is the premier men’s college basketball conference.
Regularly sending more than 60% of its teams to the NCAA Tournament, the conference looks like a force to be reckoned with every March.
Interestingly enough, despite the in-season dominance, a team from the Big Ten Conference hasn’t won the NCAA Tournament since 2000, when Tom Izzo and the Michigan State Spartans captured the title.
The Big Ten has sent 13 teams to the Final Four in the time since Michigan State’s victory, but the conference seemingly can’t get over the hump to capture another title.
When asked about the conference’s title drought, Izzo said the grief the conference has caught from fans and media personalities is ‘fair.’
“It’s fair because it has been 25 years. I used to think, ‘Oh man, I’m the last Big Ten guy [with a national title] standing.’ Last year. I’m calling [Purdue head coach Matt Painter] and I’m saying, ‘Matt, Matt, you’ve got to win this [national title] game.’ I don’t want to be the last Big Ten guy standing, you know? But I think it is a reality,” Izzo said at Big Ten Media Day last week.
While a common thought is that Big Ten teams beat each other up during conference play leading to weakened rosters in March, Izzo dispelled that. Instead, he says, every time a Big Ten team has been in position to win a title, they’ve ran into a talented opponent.
“I just don’t want it to get painted as if the Big Ten’s [drought] is because of style of play,” Izzo noted.
[ESPN]
