After a hard-fought upset of Illinois on Thursday in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament, Penn State coach Micah Shrewsberry was asked to give his opening statement.
“First of all, hats off to Illinois,” Shrewsberry said. “They’re a hard team to play against.”
Not to be outdone, Illini coach Brad Underwood gave credit to the Nittany Lions for a job well done during his opening remarks.
“My hat’s off to Penn State,” Underwood said. “They beat us three times, so we obviously haven’t figured out what the sauce is to beat them.”
Twenty-four hours later, after Penn State shocked second-seeded Northwestern in overtime in the quarterfinals, Shrewsberry lauded the Wildcats’ effort.
“Again, like my hat’s off to Northwestern,” he said. “They’ve had an unbelievable season. It’s not over for them.”
If there is one thing we’ve learned from the first four days of the Big Ten Tournament it’s that a lot of hats have been tipped. In all honesty I haven’t seen a single coach wearing a fedora, baseball cap or even a toque, but the doffing of chapeaus appears to be commonplace.
It makes one miss the olden days when Illinois coach Lou Henson called Indiana’s Bobby Knight a bully.
But it’s a kindler, gentler Big Ten now, and after 12 tournament games, a slew of upsets and a dozen or so renditions of “Seven Nation Army” by the college bands, here are five other things we’ve learned from the first four days at the United Center.
1. Smartphones are bad
The Fab Five didn’t need Twitter, texts from friends or kenpom.com rankings to know how good they were. Michigan coach Juwan Howard, a Fab Five alumnus and Chicago native, lamented that today’s players head into March knowing exactly where they stand, thanks to those ubiquitous phones.
“This world is surrounded by so much information, and the information can be delivered to you instantly,” Howard said Thursday after his bubble team lost in the second round to Rutgers. “I call it a microwave world because not only is there so much information out there, our young men are able to see it, read it, and they understood the magnitude of this game.
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“And they’ve heard it so many times from media or social media how every game’s important, what lies on it and what your fate would look like if you can move forward to advance to the NCAA Tournament.”
Rutgers coach Steve Pikiell is so anti-smartphone he recently destroyed his in front of his players to make a point.
“He wants us to throw them away,” Rutgers guard Caleb McConnell told reporters. “If you have any cellphones in here, I advise you not to pull them out around him because he might smash yours.”
Fortunately, Pikiell restrained himself. But he claimed the problem with phones is that “people tell (the players) how great they are when we win, tell them how bad they are (when they don’t). … The phones don’t help them be better players. They don’t help them.”
2. Columbus is not Tom Izzo’s kind of town
Michigan State and coach Tom Izzo lost to upstart Ohio State on Friday and proceeded to criticize an unnamed reporter from Columbus, Ohio, who apparently criticized his friend, Buckeyes coach Chris Holtmann.
“I’m giving (the Buckeyes) a lot of credit, so make sure you guys from Columbus, especially my buddy back home, understand they still made some shots from heaven, and that’s kind of what happens,” Izzo said.
He continued ranting later, saying: “I give (Holtmann) a lot of credit because I know what it’s like in Columbus. It’s not as bad there in basketball as it is in football, but I know what it’s like.”
If the NCAA selection committee has a sense of humor, it would send Michigan State to the Columbus, Ohio, region.
3. The Big Ten schedule is a grind
The Big Ten ranks third in the NCAA behind the Big 12 and the SEC. Yet every coach maintains it’s the toughest conference to get through.
“It’s fun, but it’s a grind,” Northwestern coach Chris Collins said. “The level of competition, the physicality, the coaches you face, the players you face. I think it’s going to be exciting for all of us as Big Ten teams — nine, 10 (or how many team) get in — to kind of say, ‘You know what, let’s put the Big Ten on the back burner and let’s go out and see if we can make some noise against the rest of the nation.’ “
Underwood added that the NCAA Tournament also is a “grind,” saying “you’ve got to have guys who can make baskets.”
That certainly would help the Illini.
Either way, Underwood is thankful Illinois won’t have to face a Big Ten team in their first game.
“We’ll give it a whirl next week, wherever they tell us (to play), and against somebody that’s not in the Big Ten,” he said.
4. Being on the NCAA bubble is hard
With Wisconsin on the bubble, coach Greg Gard wasn’t sure if the Badgers would be invited to the Big Dance.
“I’m not a bracketologist,” Gard said. “You can look around and find differing opinions. If we are, we’ll get ready to go and do that, and if we’re not, we’ve had a lot of opportunities to put ourselves in position.”
Consensus opinion is they won’t get in.
5. Every Big Ten team has gone through some adversity.
Everyone is beatable and has had a tough stretch of games, leading to media and fan skepticism. How did the coaches get over the criticism and mistakes and keep their players positive? Only one had a unique solution.
“Smashed the phones,” Pikiell said.