Big Ten basketball preview by team — Can Michigan contend? Part I

If there’s one thing we can say for certain about Big Ten basketball in the early going it’s that there’s not a team that’s head and shoulders above the others. There are some good teams, sure, but those expected to contend for the title have all been blown out. Some, like Michigan State, already have a bad conference loss (home to Northwestern) on the resume.

RELATED: What we know about this Michigan basketball team after a loss to North Carolina

To be fair, the Wildcats have improved under Chris Collins, but that’s not a game you should be losing at home. Penn State is another that looks better, having taken it to Illinois in Champaign.

We turn to The Fort basketball godfather MHoops1 (known not as famously as Jeff Schiller — MHoops1 pajama sets still available for Xmas delivery if ordered by 5 p.m. today) for his take on the Big Ten teams heading toward the Big Ten season.

ILLINOIS: What in the world is going on in Champaign? Last Saturday, one week removed from Bad Underwood’s epic farting noises meltdown after the loss to Penn State, transfer Matthew Mayer popped up after a somewhat tougher than expected win over Alabama A&M (up 2 with under 11 minutes to go before pulling away) and said, “We’ve got a lot to figure out internally between players and coaches.”

Though Mayer tried to backpedal a bit, claiming that he was “just upset,” and he and fart noises recipient Terrence Shannon put a “team will be fine” face on things, that kind of stuff hints of issues that winning might solve, but losing might combust.

The Illini have some time to right the ship internally. That said, if they don’t do it soon, they may be headed for an iceberg … and last night’s blowout loss to Missouri (insert fart noise here) indicates they’re looking more like the Titanic than the Carpathia right now.

INDIANA: The Hoosiers have different concerns — namely, what to do in the backcourt. I thought the Hoosiers were overrated pre-season because they had the same, “we can’t really space the floor for Trayce Jackson-Davis: problems they’ve had in the past three seasons. And now, they appear to have lost starting point guard Xavier Johnson, one of their perimeter threats, for much, if not all of the season.

While Johnson had really struggled in the three plus games before the injury against Kansas, he was the heart of Indiana’s perimeter defense, and he has been a 38 percent shooter from long range since enrolling in Bloomington. Now, the point guard job falls to highly touted freshman Jalen Hood-Schifino, who himself has missed three games with a back injury, and who has been notably inefficient (offensive rating 89.8, effective shooting percentage 43.7 percent) when he has played.

Perhaps Hood-Schifino will improve, a la Michigan point Dug McDaniel, when he is the guy and isn’t looking over his shoulder. He’s certainly talented enough that this could happen. If it doesn’t though, IU is out of options at a critical spot.

IOWA: Kudos to Fran McCaffery for once again losing his two best offensive players (Luka Garza and Joe Wieskamp after ’20-’21; Keegan Davis and Jordan Bohannon after last season) and still being an extremely good offensive team. The defense — well, that’s been a constant problem throughout Fran’s regime, and it showed up two nights ago when Iowa became the first team in over 30 years to lose to a 30-plus point underdog in a 92-83 loss to a terrible Eastern Illinois team.

Offensively, however, McCaffrey a really, really good offensive coach doing it with underrated talent on a yearly basis. For those who are already panicking about the mere possibility that Michigan will lose both Hunter Dickinson and Jett Howard after this season and will fall into oblivion as a result, those Iowa teams — as well as Wisconsin this year (after losing Johnny Davis and Brad Davison), OSU (after losing E.J. Liddell and Malaki Branham), Michigan 2010-11 (after losing our only double digit scorers in Manny Harris and Deshawn Sims), Michigan 2019-20 (after losing our only double digit scorers in Ignas Brazdeikis, Jordan Poole and Charles Matthews and the coach, to boot), and literally dozens of other examples should elicit a “not so fast, my friend” response.

Have a good program, run good stuff, plug in guys with some experience in the system (or in the case of OSU, incoming freshmen ready to score), and good things happen. Believe it or not, very good players leave teams college basketball teams all the time for multiple reasons, and the good programs usually find a way to replace them.

MARYLAND: After a torrid start, Maryland has come down to earth in recent games. It’s no shame at all to lose at Wisconsin, against Tennessee on a neutral court, or even UCLA at home; it’s quite another to be down 49-20 (!) at halftime against UCLA in your own gym, after being down 17 at halftime against Tennessee (before a frantic comeback almost tied the game in the closing seconds for the Terps).

Under Kevin Willard, Maryland plays good defense … and that’s a real plus. On the other side, the Terps shoot less than 32 percent from 3-point range and do not have much size, a situation which may be made even worse if sophomore center Julian Reese misses any time after suffering a shoulder injury against UCLA. It’s possible, indeed likely from reports, that his second half sit down against the Bruins was merely precautionary in light of the fact that the game was over at halftime, but it’s a concern.

Maryland absolutely needs a healthy Reese to combat the big, talented centers it will face in conference play, and it needs to shoot better from the perimeter, or even a healthy Reese is not going to be able to produce a consistent offense in Big Ten play.

MICHIGAN STATE: It’s no surprise that MSU has been up and down; a team with too few scholarship bodies (10) because of Tom Izzo’s stubborn refusal to add players from the portal after he lost his top few targets could not play through early season injuries to Jaden Akins (back now) and Malik Hall (still lingering).

When healthy, MSU is a high floor, low ceiling, veteran team with no stars and a lot of experience playing together and in Izzo’s system. The brightest spot for MSU so far … the emergence of Mady Sissoko as an interior presence on the defensive end and on the glass. Sissoko isn’t a great player, especially on the offensive end, but in light of the freshman struggles of Jaxon Kohler, a player much heralded by Spartan fans (Kohler is shooting 39 percent from the field, including 0-1 from 3, and has an offensive efficiency rating of 86.8 (again, 100 is average)), he’s a very necessary one and a solid contributor.

He’s also yet another in the endless number of examples of guys who look bad early, develop later, and by doing so, confound those who want to label kids busts early in their careers. Who knew?

MINNESOTA: The Gophers have exactly three players on the roster — Jamison Battle, Dawson Garcia and Ta’Lon Cooper — with any business playing in the Big Ten at this stage of their career development. That’s a tough place to start, especially since none is an all-league talent, and it’s especially difficult if all aren’t playing well at the same time, which they have not done to date.

Ben Johnson is a good young coach, but Richard Pitino left him in a ridiculous hole, and it’s going to take a while to assemble the underpinnings of a structure, much less fill it. Meanwhile, Little Ricky has started 11-0 in his second season at New Mexico and just beat his dad head to head.

NEBRASKA: The Cornhuskers actually looks a bit more like a basketball team this season, rather than a group auditioning for Last Chance U., basketball edition. Derrick Walker is playing extremely well inside, and there have been some pieces from game to game on the perimeter.

While Fred Hoiberg isn’t competing for post-season with this team — he’s not even likely to avoid the Wednesday first four at the Big Ten Tournament — things are a bit better in Lincoln, and the Huskers will step up and take down one or more teams vying for post-season honors.