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Welcome to “Good Morning, Illini Nation,” your daily dose of college basketball news from Illini beat writer and AP Top 25 voter Scott Richey. He’ll offer up insights every morning on Brad Underwood’s team and college basketball at large:
The Big Ten announced last month, while releasing its conference schedule for the 2025-26 season, it would expand its conference tournament to include all 18 teams. That comes a year after the newly-expanded Big Ten invited just 15 teams to Indianapolis, with Nebraska, Penn State and Washington left out as the bottom three teams in the conference.
“I think (the coaches) felt pretty strongly last year that everybody should have an opportunity to go,” Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti said last week at Big Ten media days in Rosemont. “They thought that was the best position. Part of also, when you think about how you position your conference tournament, is what impact does it have on how you qualify for the NCAA. How are you handling the top seeds in your league? What are you asking them to do? Are you providing opportunities?
“I think there might have been one or two teams last year that felt they were here, got on a run, they may have increased their chances to go to the bubble and get in. … Our athletic directors agreed to let the coaches’ opinion really carry the day. We did it one way last year. We’ll be all comers this year, and we’ll evaluate it after.”
Count Nebraska coach Fred Hoiberg among those supporting an 18-team version of the Big Ten tournament, which will run March 10-15 this season at the United Center in Chicago. The Cornhuskers lost their final five games and six of their last seven to wind up on the outside looking in at the Big Ten tournament last season after losing a five-team tiebreaker.
“I think it’s a great decision,” Hoiberg said at Big Ten media days. “You look at even the teams that finished all at the bottom, and there were some unbelievable upsets in our league. The parity that we have with the 18 teams, I think everybody deserves an opportunity to go out there and make a run in the March tournaments.”