B1G Men's Basketball Tournament Preview - Day 2
5 SEED
SCHOOL: Michigan State University
LOCATION: East Lansing, MI
COACH: Tom “The Man-Lizard” Izzo
RECORD: 18-13
MASCOT: Sparty the Spartan
MOTTO: “No, we’re the other Michigan. Remember? Magic Johnson went here in—ah, whatever. Fuck it.”
NOTABLE ALUMS: Your mom
About the school:
MSU has a “Rock” and a Kellogg. They hate us cuz they ain’t us.
About the team:
MSU is certainly not as evil and hate-able as their in-state rival, but they manage to be at least somewhat evil and hate-able in their own right. They stripped victory from our claws once this season, in a victory many sports analysts would call “fake and very dumb.” Only after the game was over, though, did we realize that halfway through, the MSU robotics department replaced players with cyborgs (in fairness, kudos to their robotics department—them’s some good basketball robots!), which is truly the only way that such a mediocre team could’ve beaten the ‘Cats.
In hindsight, our mistake was probably not encouraging Coach Collins to press refs and say “they obviously can’t be beating us—can I get a box review of whether or not they are now cyborgs?” Had cyborgs not invaded the game at halftime, science has concluded that Northwestern would have won by at least a 50,000 point margin, as Scottie Lindsey was on a pre-mono hot streak (not unlike one experienced by a werewolf--right before the transformation occurs in full, which would likely displace a B1G standout for a couple of weeks. But I digress.)
6 SEED
NU / 21-10 / Chris Collins
SEPARATE PROFILE COMING SOON
7 SEED
SCHOOL: University of Iowa
LOCATION: Iowa City, IA
COACH: Fran “The Nanny” McCaffery (“The antivirus?”)
RECORD: 18-13
MASCOT: Herkey the Hawk / the Hawkeyes (so not even the whole hawk; just their eyes. They’re really the Iowa Eyes)
MOTTO: “Iowa: Important Because of Corn”
NOTABLE ALUMS: Brooks Wheelan, Tom Brokaw, Paul Rust
About the school:
Iowa is a very bad state, and an annoying school with fans like this (insert kilt photo--will send after), but the worst part is that in the Netflix series LOVE, Iowa alum Paul Rust plays Gus, one of the most infuriatingly terrible on-fire garbage cans in all of TV history. Feel free to share your thoughts on the series in the comments, and I will be more than happy to continue this discussion, because the only thing worse than the state of Iowa is Gus from LOVE. Also, they’re bad at basketball, right? Yeah, that’s what I was talking about. Anyway.
About the team:
I’m not even gonna write a satirical bit here, because holy fuck, you guys, we beat Iowa by THIRTY FIVE POINTS.
What could I write that would be better than Charlie Hall getting minutes, during which, his only contribution was a wildly airballed 3? Than our crowd taunting their most productive player to the bench to avoid a technical because we just kept yelling his own name at him (you reading this, TYLER?)? Us shutting down another key player who had been hot all season? Continuing to yell at Tyler to get off the bench?
I CAN’T BE FUNNIER THAN THIS VICTORY ALREADY WAS.
8 SEED
SCHOOL: University of Michigan
LOCATION: Ann Arbor, MI
COACH: John “The Body” Beilein
RECORD: 20-11
MASCOT: Wolf Blitzer, I shit you not
MOTTO: “Hail to the Victors? More like FAIL to the Victors, amirite?!”
NOTABLE ALUMS: The Unabomber! Hah hah! Fuck you, Michigan!
About the school:
The state of Michigan gave us Betsey DeVos; Michigan University gave Ben Carson his MD.
About the team:
The University of Michigan is the The Ohio State of day 2 teams (right down to the notorious serial killer alums!).
Michigan was and is considered by many in the B1G to be a powerhouse—yet, one that, predictably, simply couldn’t withstand the brute force of the Northwestern Wildcats. Yes, our game will be remembered forever for The Pass, but what has already been forgotten about our historic bout is not any one play, but the whinings of Michigan’s very own nerd from a John Hughes movie: one Moritz Wagner. Several penalties, and one missed dunk (sending both the ball AND his father’s disappointment in him ratcheting skyward).
Also, a fun fact: little did UM know, the game was also a battle for naming rights to the lake formerly known as Lake Michigan. Current contenders (subject to change) are Lake Northwestern University, Lake of Our Lady of the Eternal Wildcat or Lake Phil.
Harbaugh sucks.
9 SEED
SCHOOL: University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign
LOCATION: Champaign-Urbana (yeah, Illinois’ kind of got this “geography is dumb” vibe; see more below)
COACH: John “I am Lex Luther” Groce
RECORD: 18-13
MASCOT: the Fighting Illini, as represented by a letter ‘I’ (because they can't figure out a mascot that isn't super racist)
MOTTO: “Taylor, I’ll let you finish, but we at Illinois truly believe that Florida Georgia Line had one of the best albums of all time”
NOTABLE ALUMS: a chorus of resounding “boooooo”s.
About the school:
The University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign thinks they are Chicago’s Big Ten Team, and Northwestern thinks that is just so precious.
About the team:
Our beloved Wildcats fell twice to the Illinois Fighting Illini, once at home (in the very same county as the city of Chicago proper) and once, in Champaign-Urbana, a three hour drive away from Chicago (and any semblance of civilized sanity).
That’s right; perhaps it was the dominating power of former Geico Caveman, Michael Finke, or perhaps it was the face-punchingly violent performance by face-puncher-in-residence Malcom Hill (arrested for punching a woman in the face at a club), or perhaps it was because everyone just sucks a little bit more in central Illinois, but the Wildcats twice succumbed to the power of the letter I *shudder and tremble*.
That said, after each game, the true victory was knowing that the Wildcats would return home to Cook County—where we pay the same sales tax as our next-door neighbor, Chicago, which they can reach within three train stops, or a single shuttle ride to the Downtown Chicago campus of Northwestern University. All the while, the Illini were destined to Champaign-Urbana, where they can sleep easily knowing that they are the B1G team of the non-Chicago part of Illinois.
10 SEED
SCHOOL: Indiana University
LOCATION: Bloomington, IN
COACH: Tom “Sweatsuits” Crean
RECORD: 17-14
MASCOT: Self-loathing
MOTTO: “More like Never-Gonna-Windiana, amirite?”
NOTABLE ALUMS: Jim Jones, Joe Buck
About the school: A Hoosier is defined as a citizen of the state of Indiana—so, why are they trying SO HARD to look like Wisconsin?? (colors, logo)
About the team: Indiana is, by all accounts, a super mediocre team, who the Wildcats graciously allowed to emerge victors after the hand of God itself interfered in their Bloomington matchup (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-huCrDTsUfQ). This victory was also, in some ways, an olive branch of sorts, offered after the wholehearted destruction the Hoosiers experienced at Welsh-Ryan. Indiana native Bryant McIntosh delivered one of the most memorable performances of his career—not only in basketball, but also as the lead in an impromptu production of Footloose that erupted during halftime.
After stopping one show 1) with his mad good basketballing skills, then the other 2) because of BTN halftime time restrictions, he led the ‘Cats to a 79 to -14 victory. The loss so humiliated the Hoosiers, in fact, that upon leaving our beloved Litterbox, they gave each other swirlies in the charter bus bathroom on the way home. Poor guys.
