We’re now officially in the college basketball offseason, a long seven months where the NBA playoffs, major league baseball, and eventually football serve as poor stand-ins for our sports attention. But before we shift into that fruitless exercise, let’s take a quick look at what awaits us beyond the gap.

In Monday’s national championship, Michigan kept up its impressive tournament run of scoring on the college game’s best defenses, but its own defense just couldn’t slow Louisville enough to take home the title.

On Friday, Mike predicted that whichever of Syracuse or Michigan scored over a point per trip would win, and he further opined that Michigan was up to the task and would prevail with a five-point win.

After nearly five months of basketball, we’re now down to the Final Four, with Michigan the lone Big Ten representative. Needless to say, a national title for the Wolverines would provide a nice boost for the conference’s reputation, as banners carry more lasting relevance than computer ratings that have pegged the Big Ten as the nation’s best conference for three years running. Rightly or wrongly, postseason success trumps all else.

While most have been focused on the drama that has led to this weekend’s Final Four (which we will preview Friday), Iowa has quietly been dispatching solid teams in the NIT. The Hawkeyes had a relatively easy time with Maryland last night and will face Baylor in the championship Thursday night.

With two-and-a-half minutes left against Kansas, Michigan was losing by 10, and its season looked done. From that point on, Michigan went on a 104-72 run over the rest of the weekend.

Thursday was a mixed bag for the Big Ten, with just one team advancing to the Elite Eight in unconvincing fashion. Before Friday’s action tips off, let’s have a look at last night’s results.

Recently we previewed Thursday’s NCAA Tournament games involving Big Ten teams. Today, we look at Friday’s matchups for the two representatives from the Great Lakes State.

As expected, four Big Ten teams have advanced to the Sweet 16, with play resuming Thursday night. Let’s take a close look at tomorrow’s matchups (Ohio State vs. Arizona; Indiana vs. Syracuse). On Thursday, we’ll preview Friday’s regional semifinals (Michigan State vs. Michigan vs. Kansas).

When the dust settled on the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, the Big Ten had four teams standing in the Sweet Sixteen. Here are some scattered thoughts on the action, bullet-point style:

As we sit on the cusp of postseason play for nine Big Ten teams, it feels an appropriate time to revisit where we were just four short months ago, previewing a season that was about to unfold before us. Did we nail it, or do we need to turn in our Geek cards?

Ohio State won the Big Ten Tournament this weekend, the fourth time that Thad Matta’s team has taken home the crown. While the Buckeyes won largely on the strength of its defense—holding Wisconsin to under 0.8 points per possession—this Ohio State team has been offensively excellent over the back half of its Big Ten schedule:

Indiana and Wisconsin tipped things off on Saturday in a back-and-forth affair that did not go according to script. For one, Indiana was supposed to be the athletic offensive rebounding powerhouse, but it was Wisconsin that was crashing the offensive glass early, collecting  43 percent of its misses in the first half.

Scouting matters. Have all the talent in the world, but if you don’t know your opponent, you’ll get sliced up. So credit Indiana for blowing up Illinois’ offense by stretching its defense well out to the perimeter in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament. There was no space to breathe for Illinois’ shooters, and consequently just 6 of Illinois’ 27 field goal attempts were three-pointers in the first half.

The tournament opener between Illinois and Minnesota didn’t offer much in the way of aesthetically pleasing play, but a buzzer beater has a way of upping the entertainment value. The Gophers turned it over on a season-worst 35 percent of their possessions, allowing the Illini to stay in the game dispute big Minnesota advantages in every other category.