During Thursday night’s game between Indiana and Minnesota at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Indiana, our BTN cameras caught two celebrities with some pretty good seats. Musician John Mellencamp and actress Meg Ryan were watching the game and BTN announcers Gus Johnson and Jim Jackson discussed it. Jackson: “I’m sure you got some of that John Mellencamp in your iPod, right?” Johnson: “I certainly do.”

Just as we did during 2010-2011 hoops season, we’re archiving Gus Johnson’s greatest calls this season. Johnson is calling men’s basketball for BTN all winter long. We clip and post his best calls and archive them here during games, so bookmark the page and come back all season right up through the Big Ten tourney. Johnson and Jim Jackson called Thursday night’s game in Bloomington.

Penn State picked up its first conference home win by beating Michigan 78-63. Michigan at Penn State was one of six Big Ten women’s basketball games on Thursdaybnight. The others: Indiana at Michigan State, Northwestern at Ohio State, Purdue at Minnesota, and Nebrask at Wisconsin. Get updated results on our BTN women’s basketball scoreboard.

The 2011 season was barely punctuated, and the 2012 football polls were already coming out. LSU looks like a consensus pick for No. 1, but the Big Ten is well represented. In the five polls I found, Michigan, Michigan State and Wisconsin all were ranked. And Nebraska appeared in all but one poll. Ohio State, which is ineligible to win the Big Ten title or play in a bowl in 2012 because of probation, is in two polls.

At 5-foot-7, Courtney Boylan is the smallest player on Michigan’s roster, and one of the smallest players in the league. But she’s a big, big reason the Wolverines are 13-3 and coming off one of the biggest wins in the Big Ten this season.  Basketball analyst and writer Patricia Babcock McGraw talks to Boylan in her latest Gimme 5 audio segment. Jump down in this post to read and hear more.