MSU’s NCAA tourney résumé should be enough
Barring big collapse, Spartans on way to upping streak to 26
Michigan State basketball has produced a wide range of emotions this year but the primary one could be relief, as Tom Izzo and the Spartans should make the NCAA tournament for the 26th consecutive time, extending the record by one coach at a single school.
MSU delivered a deflating performance at home Tuesday against Iowa, seemingly wiping away any goodwill the Spartans built up in winning three in a row and eight of their previous 10 entering the matchup with the Hawkeyes.
Following the loss, Michigan State sits at 1710 overall and 9-7 in Big Ten play. MSU has been flirting with the NCAA bubble throughout the season, though the Spartans seem to have positioned themselves safely on the right side, even with the latest letdown. The Spartans are tied for fifth in the standings (with Nebraska), a game behind 10-6 Northwestern, with four regular-season games remaining, including a March 6 matchup with the Wildcats in East Lansing. The top four teams in the Big Ten receive double-byes in the conference tourney, set for March 13-17 in Minneapolis.
The questions remain: Is Michigan State safe to make the tournament and extend its NCAA streak, and how big is that cushion? Let’s dive into that below.
Michigan State tournament résumé
The NCAA tournament streak should be safe for another season, barring a spectacular collapse over the next three weeks. As of right now, Michigan State has a 97.8% chance of making the NCAA tournament field, according to analytics website BartTorvik, and has a 98.3% chance of receiving an at-large bid.
MSU’s overall record isn’t the most impressive among power-conference teams, but the Spartans have picked up key wins throughout the season. They hold a pair of wins over teams that were ranked top-10 at the time, Baylor and Illinois, and have beaten other tournament hopefuls such as Butler (by 20 on Nov. 17) and Indiana State (by 12 on Dec. 30). They have two potential résumé boosters left, with games against Northwestern and Purdue in March, and two opponents that could add another
blemish in Ohio State and Indiana.
The résumé has both its pros and cons, which will likely leave MSU closer to the middle than a top-five seed. MSU is beloved by the analytics of KenPomeroy, Bart Torvik and the NCAA’s NET rankings, the three main websites used to determine tournament chances, due to their strength of schedule and ability to stay close while maintaining a strong adjusted efficiency (offensive efficiency minus defensive efficiency). MSU is top-20 in both KenPom and BartTorvik’s adjusted efficiency, while NET has them ranked 24th — suggesting a 6-seed in the bracket if those were the only factors taken into account.
NET, one of the main factors the committee weighs when putting the bracket together, is based on adjusted efficiency and something known as the Team Value Index, which is based on game results and factors the result, where the game was played and the outcome. Each win for a team falls into one of four quadrants, from Quad 1 wins, which carry the most weight, down to Quad 4. Quad 1 wins come when a team beats a team ranked 1-30 in NET at home, 1-50 on a neutral court and 1-75 on the road. (Though this can be tricky, as the NCAA only counts the final NET ranks, not a team’s rank when playing the game.)
Michigan State’s tough schedule means it hasn’t been able to pile up Quad 1 wins. MSU is 3-7 against Quad 1 opponents (wins over Baylor on a neutral court at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit, at Maryland and Illinois) while being 5-3 against Quad 2s and a perfect 9-0 against Quad 3 and 4 opponents. MSU has won enough to be sitting comfortably, but the lack of résuméboosting wins will most likely push them down the seed line on Selection Sunday.
The easiest way to bolster the résumé at this point is to avoid any bad losses — namely, Ohio State and Northwestern at home as well as Indiana on the road. The good news: They’re projected to win all those games by KenPom, which takes into account location of the games. The only game they are projected to lose is at Purdue. An upset at Mackey Arena, however, would essentially lock in an NCAA berth while perhaps giving the Spartans a massive boost in seeding.
A run in the Big Ten tournament would also give MSU a chance to stack more Quad 1 and 2 wins — or secure an automatic bid if they can win the tournament for the first time since 2019.
Michigan State will likely need some help to earn a double-bye, however, as the Spartans are tightly bunched with Nebraska, Northwestern and Wisconsin, all of which have tiebreakers over MSU thanks to head-to-head wins.
MSU’s chances at a March Madness run
And what about the NCAA tournament itself? It could be another cameo for the Spartans, who have just one Sweet 16 appearance — last season’s loss to Kansas State — since that 2019 Final Four run. MSU’s continued issues at center has hurt them on both ends and they’ve struggled to show the same bite when leaving Breslin Center, with a 3-5 record on the road and a 1-2 record at neutral sites.
According to BetMGM, Michigan State currently has +4000 odds to win the national championship, meaning you’d make $4000 on a $100 wager if MSU wins it all, just behind Illinois (+3500) and ahead of Wisconsin (+5000). Purdue has the best odds of any Big Ten team at +650, which only trails defending champion Connecticut (+475) among all contenders. MSU’s odds to win it all took a sharp dive during the season after opening tied for the second-best odds to win it all, at +1200, according to the Sporting News.
But it’s tough to count out a deep run for the Spartans, as it always is with an Izzo team when the calendar flips to March.