College Hoops 2nd Best Conference History - Big Ten

The second greatest conference so far in our Value Add Basketball Game is the Big Ten - which has had 21 National Champions, and Maryland won the title in 2002 before joining the Big Ten. Here is the list by school - Chicago 1907-1909; Illinois 1915; Indiana 1940, 1953, 1976, 1981,1987; Maryland 2002; Michigan 1989; Michigan State 1979, 2000; Minnesota 1902, 1919; Northwestern 1931; Ohio State 1960; Purdue 1932; Wisconsin 1912, 1914, 1916, 1941.

The conference is led so far by the last undefeated team in basketball, Bobby Knight's 1976 squad, followed by the last actual Big Ten Champion, the 2000 Michigan State Spartans.

It truly is amazing the Big Ten has technically not won a title this century (2000 is technically is the last year of the 20th century). Consider that Frank Kaminsky led Wisconsin to a 2015 Final Four upset against the Kentucky team that was considered by some the greatest ever until that game. Further only a bizarre final few seconds cost Purdue a win over eventual national champ Virginia in 2018.  Michigan State is constantly on the verge of a title.

So far the top 6 teams in the conference are 15-6 against the other greatest teams, and rank second with a 5.8 rating - which estimates they are about 6 points better than the average great team in the game - or about 27 points better than the average team.

Rnk	Great Team	Year	Key Player	W	L	Pts	Allow	Rate
	Top 6 Other Conf			15	6	73.7	68.2	5.8
1	Indiana	1976	Scott May	3	1	71.3	59.8	9.6
2	Michigan St.	2000	Mateen Cleaves	3	0	88.3	78.3	7.3
3	Purdue	2018	Carsen Edwards	4	1	71.2	68.8	5.0
4	Michigan	1989	Glen Rice	0	1	69.0	70.0	4.6
5	Illinois	2005	Deron Williams	3	2	72.0	69.6	4.3
6	Michigan St.	1979	Magic Johnson	2	1	70.3	62.7	4.1
7	Wisconsin	2015	Frank Kaminsky	2	2	65.0	63.3	3.4
8	Michigan	1965	Cazzie Russell	1	1	81.0	71.5	2.5
9	Iowa	2021	Luka Garza	1	0	88.0	69.0	2.4
10	Ohio St.	1960	Jerry Lucas	0	1	78.0	79.0	2.2
11	Illinois	1989	Nick Anderson	1	1	78.0	77.0	2.0
12	Indiana	1981	Isaiah Thomas	1	1	73.0	73.0	1.3
13	Michigan St.	2009	Draymond Green	6	3	71.3	71.9	0.9
14	Michigan	2013	Trey Burke	1	2	70.3	69.7	0.3
15	Ohio St.	2007	Greg Oden	2	3	70.2	71.4	-0.4
16	Purdue	1969	Rick Mount	0	1	86.0	87.0	-0.8
17	Maryland	1984	Len Bias	1	1	69.5	68.5	-3.2
18	Indiana	2002	Jared Jeffries	1	3	67.3	72.8	-3.9
19	Maryland	2002	Juan Dixon	1	3	67.0	76.3	-4.0
20	Iowa	2001	Reggie Evans	1	2	71.0	75.3	-5.3

We invented the Value Add Basketball Game, and since then have grown it to to 135 teams of all-time great teams and players. We have played 188 games to date, and 63,000 unique visitors have clicked on the game. 

Seven current conferences have at least six all-time great teams in the game. We decided to rank those conferences based on the average rating of their top six teams so far in our games against other teams.

Click on the game to play yourself - it contains everything you need to play the Value Add Basketball game, which lets you pit any of 136 great all-time college teams against each other. To pick your two teams it is best to click on this Google doc and print the pages of the teams you want (each team is one page). I track my games on this google sheet, but play your own for free!

Rick Berry's Miami vs. Izzo' MSU National Champs

After a few days of updating the www.valueaddbasketball.com ratings for the current 4,200 players, we went back to our all-time tournament using the Value Add Basketball Game cards for Rick Berry and his fast paced Miami 1965 and the last Big Ten National Champs - 2000 Michigan State. While this Spartans teams did not have the memorable superstars from their other two teams in our game who did very well in our first tournament - Draymond Green and Magic Johnson - but their leading scorer Morris Peterson was a great 3-point shooter who hit one of the greatest buzzer beaters in NBA history  (watch here).

Results of Miami vs Michigan State below the list of fast-paced teams below.

After noting that three of the seven best players in American right now are from the Big Ten in this blog, it is amazing that this 2000 Michigan State team was the 21st Big Ten national champ of the 20th century but no Big Ten team has won it all yet in the 21st century. We do rank one current Miami FL player in this top 10 of the ACC and another with a good shot at the NBA, but of course Rick Berry's 1965 Miami FL team that went 22-4 while outscoring teams 98-84 was an independent.

We estimate Miami played at the second fastest pace of the 128 great teams in our game, which means we use an extra sheet to play an extra 18 possessions in our game above the normal game as shown on the scoresheets below. These are the only teams for which we add possessions in our games - if neither of these teams are playing then the game plays out the last 44-53 possessions (depending on how many fouls in the final five minutes) on one sheet after assuming a 20-20 score through 22 possessions.

High Pace Team	80+ Poss
Loyola Marymount 1990	26
Miami FL 1965	18
VMI 2007	10
Jacksonville 1970	10
St. Bonaventure 1970	7
Kentucky 1970	5
Niagara 1970	5
Michigan 1965	5
Illinois 1989	4
Savannah State 2018	3
VMI 2010	3
Duke 2001	3
Georgia Tech 1990	2
Savannah State 2017	1
DePaul 1980	1

Results: 

If you follow the scoresheet below, the extra 18 possessions are played on the extra sheets and for those possessions the top line of starters on each team card (see player cards below for both teams) play half the possessions while the bottom line of five reserves play the other half (the next nine). At the end of the extra sheet the score was 48-42 Michigan State as you can see from the running score to start the full sheet that would normally start the game at 20-20.

With five minutes to play in the game Izzo's defense had held Berry to 21 points but Miami had cut the score from double digits for much of the second half to 90-84.

With 5:49 (10 possessions to go) Berry scored to make it 88-84. On their next possession Berry drew a foul which first created an extra possession (in the last 5 minutes a foul or steal and fast break creates an extra possession below the diagonal) and then when he hit both free throws (he makes them on a 1-17 on the 20-sided die or 85% of the time) the margin was down to 4 points again - 92-88.

The Spartans finally got two straight stops and took a 94-88 lead on AJ Granger's offensive rebound and score. Then Michigan State's leading scorer, Morris Peterson, came through with the biggest play of the game when he hit a 3-pointer and was fouled, completing the 4-point play to make it 98-88 and MSU held on for a 108-104 win to advance.

While not famous like Berry, Peterson became a great 3-point shooter that last year during Michigan State's title run, and for another decade in the NBA. While in the NBA he hit one of the greatest buzzer beaters ever, when the Raptors appeared to have lost down three when the Wizards Mike Ruffin intercepted a pass and threw it up in the air to kill the final ticks. In a play you need to watch here to believe, Peterson waited for it to come down, caught it, and made an insane contested lefthanded 3-pointer while twisting his body to beat the buzzer.

Peterson's heroics in this simulated game against one of the fastest paced teams in history and he scored 33 points in our up-and-down high possession game. This was the other extreme from the actual national semifinals when he overcame one of the slowest paced opponents - the Wisconsin Badgers stall that held the Spartans to a 19-17 lead at halftime. In that game Peterson opened the second half with 10 points in a 13-2 run that led MSU to the title game where they beat Florida for the national championship.

Here is our scoresheet, followed by pictures of the two teams cards from the 128 teams available for free by clicking on the Value Add Basketball Game.