big ten tie breaker scenarios, it's very good (and thorough), but with crap punctuation

from the bigten.org website; i know, it's a pretty dry read but bear with me it'll get better after the jump

Ties for seeding the Big Ten Men's Basketball Tournament will be broken as follows:

In case of a tie for any place finish in the regular-season standings, the following tie-breaking procedure shall be followed in order to seed teams in the Tournament bracket.

TWO-TEAM TIE

1. Results of head-to-head competition during the regular season.

2. Each team's record vs. the team occupying the highest position in the final regular season standings (or in the case of a tie for the championship, the next highest position in the regular season standings) continuing down through the standings until one team gains an advantage.

• A. When arriving at another pair of tied teams while comparing records, use each team's record against the collective tied teams as a group (prior to their own tie-breaking procedures), rather than the performance against the individual tied teams.
• B. When comparing records against a single team or a group of teams, the higher winning percentage shall prevail, even if the number of games played against the team or group is unequal (i.e., 2-0 is better than 3-1); in the case of tied percentages vs. the team or group of 1.000 or .000 the following shall apply: 2-0 is better than 1-0; 0-1 is better than 0-2.

3. Won-loss percentage of all Division I opponents.

4. Coin toss conducted by the Commissioner or designee.

MULTIPLE-TEAM TIE

1. Results of head-to-head competition during the regular season.

• A. When comparing records against a single team or a group of teams, the higher winning percentage shall prevail, even if the number of games played against the team or group are unequal (i.e., 2-0 is better than 3-1); in the case of tied percentages vs. the team or group of 1.000 or .000 the following shall apply: 2-0 is better than 1-0; 0-1 is better than 0-2.
• B. After the top team among the tied teams is determined, the second team is ranked by its record among the original tied teams, not the head-to-head record vs. the remaining team(s).

2. If the remaining teams are still tied, then each tied team's record shall be compared to the team occupying the highest position in the final regular-season standings, continuing down through the standings until one team gains an advantage.

• A. When arriving at another pair of tied teams while comparing records, use each team's record against the collective tied teams as a group (prior to their own tie-breaking procedures), rather than the performance against the individual tied teams.
• B. When comparing records against a single team or a group of teams, the higher winning percentage shall prevail, even if the number of games played against the team or group are unequal (i.e., 2-0 is better than 3-1); in the case of tied percentages vs. the team or group of 1.000 or .000 the following shall apply: 2-0 is better than 1-0; 0-1 is better than 0-2.

3. Won-loss percentage of all Division I opponents.

4. Coin toss conducted by the Commissioner or designee.

now on to actually what that means for the schools this year

this is ALL assuming that Wisconsin beats IU tonight (which they will) so throw the Badgers' and the Hoosiers' blurbs out if that game doesn;t go according to plan, we will just start at the top and work our way down.

1. Ohio St: 15-2

games remaining: at home against Wisconsin on Sunday

possible ties: Purdue at 15-3 if they lose and Purdue beats Iowa

the skinny: Ohio State would lose the tiebreaker to Purdue based on head to head being tied at 1-1 and their 0-2 record against Wisconsin being worse than Purdue's 1-1

2. Purdue: 14-3

games remaining: @ Iowa on Saturday

possible ties: to Ohio St for first at 15-3(see above) or to Wisconsin at 14-4 for second if they lose and Wisconsin wins @OSU

the skinny: see above for the OSU scenario, Purdue would be relegated to the 3 seed based on their head to head with Wisconsin being tied at 1-1 and their 1-1 record against OSU being worse than Wisconsin's 2-0

3. Wisconsin: 12(13)-4

games remaining: (@IU), @OSU

possible ties: see above

the skinny: see above (although if they lose to IU they are locked into the 3 seed)

this is where things get nutty

4. Michigan St; 9-8

games remaining: @ Michigan

possible ties: with Michigan, Illinois and Penn St for 4th at 9-9 if they lose @Michigan and Illinois beats IU at home and Penn State wins @Minn. with Michigan and Illinois if they lose and Illinois wins and PSU loses, with Michigan and PSU if they lose and PSU wins and Illinois loses and finally with Michigan if they lose and both Illinois and PSU also lose

the skinny: if they win @ UM they are the 4 seed. no question. but if they lose and all 3 of the other teams win (very likely) it's a 4 way tie for 4th and things go freaking crazy. so try and follow along.

in that scenario MSU would get relegated to the 6th seed and here's why: the intitial tiebreaker is total record against the 4 teams tied,  which breaks down as such: 1. Michigan 4-1  2. Illinois 3-2  3. PSU 2-4  3. MSU 2-4.  This means that Michigan would be the 4 seed and play Illinois in the 4/5 game and would leave Penn St and Michigan St tied to determine 6/7.   What would eventually separate the Spartans from the Nittany Lions is that while Penn St lost to league leading Ohio St twice, MSU was fortunate enough to only play (and lose) to them once.  And since (for the purposes of a tiebreak) 0-1 is better than 0-2 MSU would receive the higher seed.

now, if they lose and end tied with Michigan and Illinois then they would again be relegated to the 6 seed as the head-to-head tiebreak would look as follows 1. Illinois 2-1  2. Michigan 2-1  3. MSU 1-2.  (in this case Illinois would get the 4 and Michigan the 5 based their head-to-head win in the only meeting between the wolverines and illini)

if we swap out Illinois for Penn St then the Spartans would receive the 5 seed and play Michigan as the 4.  Head-to-head comparison would look as follows 1. Michigan 4-0  2. MSU 1-3  3. PSU 1-3 with MSU getting the tiebreak for the aforementioned record against Ohio St

and finally if Michigan State is ends only tied with Michigan then they would turn right around and replay them as the 5 seed in the 4/5 matchup based on being swept by the Wolverines

takes a DEEP breath

moving on

5. Illinois: 8-9

possible ties: dear God please see above, also could tie with Penn State and Michigan at 8-10 if all 3 lose, or could tie at 8-10 with just Penn St or just Michigan

the skinny: if all 3 tie at 8-10 then illinois would be the ugliest #5 seed in the history of the big ten tournament based on head-to-head results of 1. Illinois 2-1  2. Michigan 2-1  3. PSU 1-3.  with Illinois taking the next tiebreaker based on their win against Wisconsin.

if the Illini end tied only with Michigan at 8-10 (and PSU is 9-9) then they would ultimately get the 6 seed because they beat the Wolverines in their only meeting this year

if they end up only tied with Penn State for 6th at 8-10.  They would be tied head to head at 1 game apiece but the illini would win the 6 seed because they (like Michigan St) had the fortune of only playing (and losing) to Ohio St once

6. Michigan; 8-9

possible ties: see above for everything but a possible 8-10 tie with only Penn St

the skinny: if Michigan loses at home to MSU and Penn St loses @Minnesota (and Illinois wins against IU) then the Wolverines would win the 6 seed based on sweeping the Lions

7. Penn St: 8-9

possible ties: all covered above

the skinny: already taken care of, fool

8. Northwestern: 7-11

possible ties: if Minnesota manages to beat Penn St at home on Sunday then they will finish tied with the Wildcats at 7-11

the skinny: it's already a forgone conclusion that Northwestern and Minnesota are playing in the 8/9 game since they can't catch any other team or be caught by any other team.  However, it's interesting to note that no matter what happens with Minnesota and Penn St that the wildcats get to wear the home whites based on their win over the gophers in their only meeting this season.

9. Minnesota: 6 -11

possible ties: see above

the skinny: see above

10. Indiana: 3-13(14)

possible ties: barring Wisconsin or Illinois taking a fat dump on their home courts, the Hoosiers are going to finish ties for last with Iowa

the skinny: if the inevitable happens IU will be the 11 seed based on their 2 loses to the Hawkeyes

11. Iowa: 3-14

possible ties: see above

the skinny: Iowa will be the 10 seed =)

ya follow all that? no? well fuck it then, this shit is difficult

for what it's worth here's how i think the Big Ten tourney will look:

Thursday

Game 1: #8 NW vs #9 Minnesota

Game 2: #7 PSU vs #10 Iowa

Game 3 #6 Illinois vs #11 IU

Friday

Game 4: #1OSU vs #8 NW

Game 5: #4 Michigan vs #5 MSU

Game 6: #2 Purdue vs #7 PSU (scariest game we could get in the Qtrs)

Game 7: #3 Wisconsin vs #6 Illinois

Saturday

Game 8: #1 OSU vs #5 MSU

Game 9: #2 Purdue vs #3 Wisconsin

Sunday

Game 10: #1 Wisconsin vs #2 Purdue

and good guys take it and a #1 seed