The Wisconsin Badgers had a rough 85-71 loss on the road to the Oregon Ducks, hurting their chances of a top-four seed in the Big Ten Tournament and marking their second straight road defeat.
Heading into the week, the Badgers were trending up after beating the Iowa Hawkeyes 84-71 to secure their fifth Quad 1 win. It was a much-needed win following Wisconsin’s loss to the Ohio State Buckeyes on the road earlier last week, and brought the Badgers back to the seven line in NCAA Tournament projections.
But with another loss on Wednesday to Oregon, which registers as a Quad 2 loss, the Badgers slid a bit in the latest NCAA Tournament projections.
Mike DeCourcy posted his latest projections on Thursday following Wisconsin’s loss, and bumped the Badgers down to the No. 30 overall team and a No. 8 seed in the tournament. They joined Utah State, Miami, and Miami (OH) as the four No. 8 seeds.
With the loss, Wisconsin fell behind UCF, Kentucky, St. Mary’s, and St. Louis, who were the four No. 7 seeds. While the Badgers are behind Kentucky, St. Mary’s, and Saint Louis in most predictive metrics, they’re well ahead of UCF in KenPom, NET, BPI, and other key metrics.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi sees it differently, having the Badgers still on the seven line alongside Utah State, Kentucky, and Saint Louis. He has St. Mary’s as an eight seed, while UCF is a nine seed.
Wisconsin has another Quad 1 opportunity on the road this weekend against the Washington Huskies, who rank inside the Top 75 in the NET rankings. The Huskies are 14-14 on the season and only 6-11 in Big Ten play, but they’ve also won two of their last three, beating Minnesota and Rutgers. So that could be another challenge for a Badgers team coming off a loss.
