greg gard is not a bug person
The Big Ten is once again tipping off conference play with a couple early December matchups as a tease before going full-bore in January. Every team in the Big Ten has played eight or nine games to this point; despite the small sample, we're already seeing some significant movement. The team expected to run away with the title, Michigan State, has stumbled out of the gates, and now there are five teams that appear to have a legitimate shot at finishing first. Let's take a look at the current standings, with preseason KenPom rankings listed at the end for context.
Current Standings
| Record | Record vs. Q1/Q2 | KenPom | Torvik | AP | Preseason KP Rank | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ohio State | 8-0 | 3-0 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 11 |
| Michigan State | 5-3 | 3-3 | 4 | 8 | 11 | 1 |
| Purdue | 5-3 | 2-3 | 5 | 4 | 7 | |
| Maryland | 9-0 | 4-0 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 16 |
| Michigan | 7-1 | 4-1 | 13 | 11 | 4 | 21 |
| Indiana | 8-0 | 1-0 | 20 | 26 | 34 | |
| Penn State | 7-1 | 2-1 | 23 | 12 | 43 | |
| Iowa | 6-2 | 2-2 | 39 | 47 | 41 | |
| Illinois | 6-2 | 0-2 | 44 | 41 | 35 | |
| Wisconsin | 4-4 | 1-4 | 60 | 54 | 45 | |
| Minnesota | 4-4 | 0-4 | 66 | 67 | 80 | |
| Rutgers | 6-2 | 0-1 | 76 | 69 | 63 | |
| Northwestern | 4-3 | 1-1 | 98 | 99 | 86 | |
| Nebraska | 4-4 | 0-1 | 146 | 153 | 96 |
Ohio State's scorching start is the story of the season thus far; I'll get into that in more depth shortly. Five Big Ten teams are in the top 13 on KemPom and top 11 on Torvik; four of them earned top-11 spots in this week's AP poll. Purdue is the advanced stats darling that doesn't have a record to match; their losses are all against top-50 teams and they made a huge move up after stomping Virginia 69-40(!) last night.
Indiana has crept up the standings mostly by not screwing up a cupcake-laden schedule. The jury is still out on Penn State, as well; they're 4-1 against top-100 KenPom teams but haven't played one ranked higher than 55th. Preseason breakout candidate Illinois has disappointed; same with Wisconsin. The bottom of the conference, expected to be bad, has been quite bad.
[Hit THE JUMP for stock up/stock down among teams and individual players, plus new tiers]
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