Following Wednesday night’s loss to Illinois, the Gophers at large chances of getting invited to the NCAA Tournament are virtually non-existent. There is obviously still the chance of them making a magical run in the Big Ten Tournament, which is being played at the Target Center — and early the automatic qualifying spot. But the NIT has become a realistic goal, so I thought there would be no time than the better to look at the odds we see the Maroon & Gold playing in a postseason tournament.
In the offseason, the NIT changed their selection process, no longer extended bids to every regular season conference winner, and instead having the top 2 teams from the Big Ten (and the rest of the major conferences) not in the National Tournament, according to the NET, automatically qualifying and they will also be guaranteed to host a first-round matchup.
All of these predictions are based off ESPN’s latest Bracketology cross referenced with the latest NET rankings.
Current Power Conference Automatic Qualifiers (as of Feb. 29):
Big Ten:
- Iowa
- Ohio State
- Maryland
- Minnesota
As it stands now, Minnesota is ranked 75th in the latest NET rankings, trailing Iowa, Ohio State and Maryland for those two automatic qualifying spots in the NIT. They are only eight spots behind Maryland and 10 behind Ohio State, but 14 behind Iowa. So every game will matter down the stretch of the regular season.
SEC
ACC
Big 12
Big East
Pac 12
At-large process:
The NIT will round out its 32 team field with the “20 best teams available.” So this information is obviously up for the NIT to interrupt and decide. If the NET rankings has such an influence on the automatic qualifying spots, I would imagine that it will have a lot to do with the at large teams.
There are currently 19 teams ranked ahead of the Gophers in the latest NET, which are currently not projected in the field according the ESPN’s latest Bracketology.
20 Best Team’s available
- Indiana State
- SMU
- Drake
- Princeton
- James Madison
- San Francisco
- McNeese State
- Grand Canyon
- Bradley
- Xavier
- Oregon
- St. Bonaventure
- Butler
- Maryland
- Richmond
- Washington
- App State
- VCU
- Kansas State
Gophers Chances:
God forbid, the Gophers do get eliminated from the Big Ten Tournament, they will be rooting for teams like Princeton, Grand Canyon and McNeese State to win their conference tournaments. Because if those three teams + one Missouri Valley Conference team (Indiana St, Bradley or Drake and one Sun Belt team (James Madison or App State), the Gophers would be the 15th highest ranked team in the NET to not make the tournament. That would be without any of the other teams making a run in their conference tournament.
So based on all this information, I would probably give the Gophers a 70-75% chance of making the NIT. Their next two home games against Penn State and Indiana are likely must wins and a (Quad 1) win at Northwestern would probably make them a lock. A lot of people were against the NIT making this change to their selection process, but looking ahead to what the field could look like, it could be a really fun event and opportunity for Minnesota to test themselves.
