If you missed it, part one—covering our comically large top tier of Big Ten teams—was posted yesterday.

Let's preview some basketball, continued.

RUTGERS

Seth: The Bricklayers.

Ace: 18-1 at home last year, 2-8 away. That might be an issue without fans feeding off their energy frenzy.

Brian: Return almost everyone of note, add Cliff Omoruyi, a top 50 C(!) whose brother played for Rutgers but decided to transfer(!!!).

Seth: Here's my final chart. I notice the one guy who could shoot who isn't a Have Ball Must Shooter was a senior.

Ace: I say this in a fond way: incredibly obnoxious defenders. Just annoying as all hell.

Brian: Only two of them have headbands but spiritually they all have headbands.

Seth: And machetes.

Ace: Again: probably not winning the conference but definitely giving some good teams some miserable nights.

Brian: The #6 defense nationally last year, somehow, and little reason to expect that will change. Will Jacob Young sabotage them in three games? Yes. Will it be amazing to watch? Yes.

Ace:

​

Brian: /giphy leeroy jenkins

Seth: He's a senior so we're going to have to find another. This may be an Indiana transition.

Ace: Young took the mantle from Isaiah Washington. There will always be another.

[After THE JUMP: the rest of the conference.]

can Archie coax better guard play from Al Durham et al.? [Marc-Gregor Campredon]

INDIANA

Ace: Sophomore center Trayce Jackson-Davis is going to be very good. Everything else? Hell if I know.

Brian: They need Kristian Lander to be a hit immediately.

Seth: So they're not going to start Joey Brunk anymore? That's a shame.

Ace: Archie Miller’s offenses have improved each year at IU with an ugly caveat: they’ve gone from 92nd to 82nd to 65th on KenPom in three years.

Brian: If anything Brunk going to play more this year. They lost DeRon Davis and don't really have any other post types unless Race Thompson counts.

Ace: They can play TJD and Thompson in the frontcourt for a lot of minutes. I thought Thompson started coming on at the end of last season but Brunk provides something of a floor, I guess.

Brian: Archie Miller is too sweaty for me to believe he will succeed.

Seth:

His Bo Ryan Index was 90%.

Ace: Not the sweatiest in the family! But he didn’t have the FBI breathing down his neck.

Brian: You get sweatier when the fuzz is on the cheese.

Ace: By comparison, dealing with IU hoops fans sounds peachy.

Brian: I may be taking too much from Indiana twitter here but it doesn't really seem like any of them believe a breakthrough is coming.

Ace: I’ll believe they have a team that’s more than a talented big man or two surrounded by crappy guard play when I see it.

Seth: Also we should note their 5-star is the penultimate 5-star, not a lottery guy this time.

Brian: Which is probably better for their program but might not be the instant plug and play savior they're gonna need to sideline Rob Phinisee and his 95 ORTG.

Good news for Brad Stevens in 21-22 though.

Ace: Tom Crean’s offenses on KenPom in his final three seasons at IU: 8th, 6th, 27th.

…don’t ask about the defenses. That is, to Miller’s credit, one area he’s shored up.

Seth: Kristian Lander is also left-handed, which left-handed point guards are a Craig Ross metric for something but I can't remember what.

less could be more for Trevion Williams [Campredon]

PURDUE

Ace: They’ve got Trevion Williams and Sasha Stefanovic and uhhhhhhhhhhhh

Maybe they unbreak Aaron Wheeler? That got sad.

Brian: Losing Haarms is going to hurt because Williams probably isn't a 30 MPG C in ideal circumstances and their backup C is now a 7'3", 290-pound freshman who was ranked #424.

Ace: Do they ever have a type, though.

Brian: They did add Ethan Morton, who is a stereotypical Purdue Just A Shooter and will be annoying as hell for four years.

Seth: Losing Haarms and Evan Boudreaux and Nojel Eastern is I don't even know who you are anymore.

Brian: My previews are going to miss the 35-year-old Frenchman who gets shoutouts from random C-list celebrities.

Slackbot: Han han han

Seth: One last time.

Brian: For Purdue's sake I hope Williams undertook the Kaleb Wesson offseason. That's what they're going to need.

MARYLAND

Seth: Finally, a team that won't get Mark Turgeon fired because it doesn't have ludicrous expectations.

Ace: That freshman class we liked is all juniors now but they’re lacking the headliners.

Brian: I was surprised people were dumping on Maryland so much and then I checked out their Kenpom page. Returning ORTGs for anyone with reasonable usage: 98, 99, 97, 68.

Ace: Pair that with an unusually bad recruiting class and… yeah. Two middling three-star commits.

Seth: The juniors you mentioned are Eric Ayala and Aaron Wiggins, who are probably better shooters than their careers thus far suggest?

Ace: Yes, they’re due for some bounceback. But this is a team looking to 2021-22, when they’ve got three four-stars on the hook.

Brian: Real bad news when Turgeon is grabbing panic transfers from Alabama and BC. Neither Jairus Hamilton nor Galin Smith started for middling-to-bad teams.

Seth: They were mostly terrifying last year because Sticks [Jalen Smith] and Anthony Cowan were exactly what Michigan didn't want to face on any given night.

Ace: Yeah, they have nothing resembling those guys on the roster now.

Brian: Honestly Turgeon is probably skating by because COVID. Otherwise this would be the season he gets axed for.

Ace: He needs those ’21 kids to hit.

nope

MINNESOTA

Ace: Marcus Carr developed into a good Big Ten point guard.

I’m mostly out of nice things to say about Minnesota now.

Seth: Speaking of THIS IS THE YEAR, the Gophers are not going to the tournament overseededly print it.

Brian: They imported grad transfers from Utah, Drake, and WMU.

Ace: [waiting for Brian to wax poetic about Daniel Oturu]

I’m sure replacing him with the Drake guy with go fine.

Brian: Was I much more of an Oturu honk than the rest of the world? Guy was pretty good.

Seth: Wait, you buried the lede with the Utah transfer. Both Gach.

Ace: No, you were just on that train earlier than most.

Seth: Both Gach. However that's pronounced it's fantabulous.

Brian: The Drake guy is at least a 7-footer who was the top usage guy on his team. Different ballpark than the MD transfers. Not a particularly encouraging ballpark all the same. Also he had the #6 block rate in the country. Some of that will translate.

Ace: Carr may near 30% usage, which is probably not going to help his numbers. The other perimeter options are Gabe Kalscheur, whose sophomore year was a major disappointment, and I’m not sure who else.

Brian: Yeah it does not take long to get into the "uhhhh really" section of the Minnesota roster. Jarvis Omersa! Michael Hurt! Isaiah Ihnen!

Ace: If you want to feel old, one of their freshmen is Jamal Mashburn Jr.

Brian: furk

Ace: Only 6'2", oddly.

"Jim Ferry"

PENN STATE

Ace: So when do they fire Pat Chamb--ohhhhhhh right.

Who is Jim Ferry

Seth: How happy are they about starting a hockey program amirite?

Brian: I've been the Lamar Stevens skeptic so I guess I should assert that I don't think losing him is going to be a giant deal, buuuuuuuut

Ace: …they’re gonna be awful without him. He was that whole team.

Brian: I like Myreon Jones.

Ace: They also no longer have Mike Watkins in the middle. Their only projected contributors over 6'7" are John Harrar and a freshman.

Brian: That freshman isn't actually coming. Their backup C is Trent Buttrick.

Seth: There's some kind of cosmic rule that Penn State must have one guy we really like, but trying to get another is flying too close to the sun.

Ace: They might start a Binghamton transfer.

NEBRASKA

Ace: Woof.

Brian: Five star commit! ...for 2021

Seth: Let me see if I can do this...

Thorir Thorbjanrason

Ace: In the meantime, this is still a team leaning hard on… that guy.

Seth: Dammit it's Thorbjarnarson.

Ace: ThorThor.

NORTHWESTERN

Seth: FloorFloor.

Ace:

Might play Pete Nance at center.

Brian: They've got that Jared Jones guy who was a brief sparkplug against M.

Ace: He transferred. To Middle Tennessee.

Brian: Oh God wow.

Ace: So maybe he can beat State now, amirite.

Seth: Boo Buie: not a true freshman point guard anymore.

Brian: The name "Boo Buie" drives me crazy, maybe if they just whisper it in the ears of their opponents they'll get a win when half the team melts down.

Ace: On the plus side, used to playing in front of an empty arena. So they’ve got that going for them.

Brian: bane dot monologue