Up until Saturday night, Illinois’ season has been described in strange terms. At that point, it was “surprising” that Illinois was undefeated. The Illini won the Maui Invitational, which was a very “prestigious” early-season tournament. This isn’t normally how one talks about an undefeated team that’s ranked in the top-15.

With the volume of competitive games slowing considerably this week, it seems like a good time to reflect on what we’ve seen in the first four weeks of the 2012-13 basketball season.

It’s been a bit of a quiet week for Big Ten basketball, with most teams facing tune-up games against over-matched opponents. Let’s take a quick look at the games that weren’t complete blowouts.

Purdue isn’t used to this. Under Matt Painter, only once have we seen the Boilermakers struggle, and that was in Painter’s understandably rebuidling 2005-06 season, which managed only a 9-19 record in the wake of Carl Landry’s knee injury that kept him off the court for the majority of the season. Since then, Purdue has won no fewer than 22 games a season. It didn’t matter if the team was relying on freshmen, whether it was short, or whether key players were lost to injuries. Painter somehow kept the whole thing going.

In a bit of a surprise, the ACC took four of six games last night to clinch a tie in this year’s Challenge. Let’s look at how they did it.

All in all, it was quite a good first night for the Big Ten in its Challenge with the ACC. Let’s take a quick look at the results.

Back to our season preview. Part one can be found here. We left off with the question of whether Matt Painter is in for a rebuilding year at Purdue.

Time for our season preview! As is BTG custom, Mike and I discuss the season as only we know how—long-windedly.

On our final point/counterpoint, we’ll deal with the question that all Big Ten fans care the most about: who will finish in last place?

In the wake of Wisconsin’s lopsided loss at the hands of Florida, I urged caution. It was early. Florida is really good, and they were playing at home. Surely, it wouldn’t be long before Bo Ryan had his team playing well enough to put any fears about the Badgers missing the NCAA Tournament to rest.

Today’s point/counterpoint: whether those 9th and 10th place predictions for Illinois are on the money.

Thanksgiving week has thus far been kind to the Big Ten, with several squads in position to win their early season tournaments. Let’s hit some of the highlights.

Yesterday, it was Maryland. Today, it’s Rutgers. With today’s news, the Big Ten is primed to become a 14-team conference starting in 2014-15. While Big Ten basketball fans have at least some familiarity with Maryland’s hoops tradition, not much is known about these Scarlet Knights. Let’s take a look at what Rutgers brings to the conference from a hoops perspective.

With the news that Maryland will be joining the Big Ten in 2014, there are all sorts of implications to evaluate. Maintaining our narrow perspective of Big Ten basketball, let’s take a look at what the addition might mean strictly on the hardcourt.

Today’s point/counterpoint is more like point/point. Sorry, Northwestern fans.