Back & Forth - WBB Bracket

With the selection show this Sunday, it's time to go back to my WBB bracket expert to see where the Illini women might land. And just like we did with the last one of these, we wrote it as a back and forth. More like a Q&A, really. I ask the questions and former WBB SID (and former football SID) Derek Neal has the answers for me. And for you.

Right to it. My questions and his answers:

The Big Ten Tournament is over and so all of the data is complete. We're certainly in, so... what kind of seed are we looking at?

Let’s start with a final look at our resume. 

Record: 21-11, 9-9 B1G
NET: 30
Torvick: 32
HerHoop Stats: 34
Overall strength of schedule: 32
Non-conference SOS: 300

Quad 1: 3-10
Wins: Maryland (NET 14), vs. MSU (NET 17), @Washington (NET 26)

Quad 2: 2-0
Wins: Indiana (NET 55), @Purdue (NET 71)

Quad 3/4: 15-1
Loss: @Oregon St. (NET 82)

And, the B1G NERDstats through the Big Ten Tournament. 

• As they have all season, the Illini are sitting 12th in the Big Ten per the computers, but a solid 32.0 average national rank average, well ahead of the bottom six teams. In fact, the Illini are closer to the third team on the list (Iowa) than they are to 13th (Indiana). 
• Eight of the 11 conference wins (including BTT) came against those bottom six teams. Thankfully, the Illini got those 3 big wins over Maryland (NET 14), at Washington (NET 26) and vs. Michigan State in the BTT (NET 17). Only get one or two of those instead of three, and we might have been sweating it out a bit on Selection Sunday.
• But they did get those wins, so where does that put our beloved in the bracket? Before the conference tournament I think the Illini were comfortably IN and likely on the 8/9 seed lines. Was the win over the Spartans enough to push that up to a 7-seed and avoid the dreaded second round game at a No. 1 seed? Maybe. A few of the major bracket projections think so: 

The more I look at it though, man, it’s hard to separate teams in the 7/8/9 range. Zoom in and see for yourself: 

Those are the 7, 8 and 9 seeds in Charlie Creme’s ESPN.com bracket projection on March 11. How would you order those teams? I feel like you could draw them out of a hat and not be wrong. That's a long way to say that I think being in a 7-10 game or an 8-9 game are equally possible.

So if we CAN escape the dreaded 8/9 game (and having to play that one-seed on their home court), who is the two-seed you'd like to see across from us? I know it will be an incredibly tough road game, but is there a team out there which would give you a "I think we could give them a run" feeling?

The 1-seeds are going to be UCONN, UCLA, Texas and South Carolina, probably in that order. They all seem a step above everyone else, so yes, avoiding the 8/9 game would be huge. 

As for 2-seeds, the likely lineup is LSU, Vanderbilt, Iowa and Duke (or possibly Michigan or Louisville). Since mega-conferences became a thing it is possible for conference teams to face each other in the second round, but it’s likely the committee will try to avoid that if possible, so let’s take Iowa and Michigan off the table. Let’s look at the other three:

All three are fantastic teams and are tough places to play (reminder that in the women’s tournament the top four seeds in each region HOST the first and second rounds in their home court). Duke’s non-conference record stands out (5-6), but they played a VERY tough schedule and took a huge step forward after a rough November. The Blue Devils finished the season 19-2, including a 17-game winning streak and are fresh off an ACC Tournament title. 

And I put LSU almost in the same class with Texas and South Carolina, so I guess that makes me lean toward Vanderbilt as the preferred 2-seed opponent. They’re the closest of the three and I’d hope to see plenty of Illini Orange in Nashville, a place our fanbase has grown to love these last few months. And a matchup with Mikayla Blakes, the nation’s leading scorer (27.0 ppg), would certainly be fun to watch.

OK, I'm all in on seeing a 7-seed and Vandy when the brackets are announced. One more question, though. Well, not a question, but a request.

Please put a frame around us discussing a 7-8-9 seed in a season after we lost those four senior starters. This was definitely a rebuilding year, and here we are discussing seed, not bubble. Incredible.

To me, this season was already a HUGE success before the squad even played a postseason game. I think I texted you at the time that I was already satisfied with the season regardless of what happened from that point on. Then the squad went out and got its 20th win (for the third time in 4 years!), and knocked off a top-20 team in the Big Ten Tournament. To do all of that with the youngest team in the conference and after losing so much from last year… man, I can’t say enough about this team, Coach Green, and the culture they’ve built here. 

For anyone that was paying attention during the Bollant and Fahey eras – the 20 year NCAA Tournament drought, the State Farm Center crowds were you could literally count the people there, the 7-77 B1G record pre-Shauna – what’s happened these last four years has been sooooooo fun to watch. 

If this core can stay together, especially the trio of Wallace, Parchment and Jackson, the next couple years could be REALLY special. Maybe Big Ten Coach of the Year Cori Close (UCLA) said it best: 

“I would say to this young core group at Illinois that, if they can stay together and through the ups and downs, fight the urge to choose themselves or to look elsewhere, I've always said the grass isn't greener on the other side— the grass is greener where you water.”

But before I get too lost in the clouds thinking about the future, there’s still a lot left on the table for this year. Getting a win or two in the NCAA Tournament would be huge for the program and for the young talent on the floor. I can’t wait for Sunday to see what that road will look like.