Michigan Beats Purdue 75-66 to Win Big Ten Tournament

All through the college basketball season, the leading contenders in the Big Ten were Michigan State, Purdue, and Ohio State. And those three did finish on top for the regular season title, with Michigan State finishing with a 16-2 conference record, followed by Ohio State and Purdue at 15-3. But Michigan was lurking just behind those three, with a conference record of 13-5. Last year, the Wolverines surprised by winning the Big Ten Tournament after finishing fifth during the regular season, and went to the Sweet Sixteen in the NCAA Tournament before losing to Oregon by one point. This year, Michigan repeated as Big Ten tournament champs by downing Iowa, Nebraska, Michigan State, and finally, Purdue in the championship game March 4th 75-66.

Michigan earns an automatic berth in The Big Dance with the Big Ten tournament championship. (We refuse to refer to the Big Ten as B1G because we think it’s dumb even if the people in charge of the conference think it’s cute or something). The Wolverines have gotten hot at the right time, and will head into the NCAA with a nine game winning streak and a 28-7 overall record.

Michigan joins four other conference tournament winners as automatic qualifiers for the NCAA Tournament. The others are Murray State (Ohio Valley), Loyola of Chicago (Missouri Valley), Radford (Big South), and Lipscomb (Atlantic Sun). The other conferences will have their tournaments this week and the entire field for the NCAA will be announced the evening of March 11th.