Wisconsin Badgers Join Unimpressive Field At Chicago Invitational

The Wisconsin Badger basketball team’s first preseason tournament of the 2011/2012 season is set. Bo Ryan and the Badgers will join the field of the Chicago Invitational Challenge over Thanksgiving weekend (November 25th and 26th). The Badgers will host a first round game at the Kohl Center before taking the tournament to Chicago’s Sears Centre Arena for the final rounds.

The Badgers will likely be the favorites heading into the tournament, perhaps challenged by the first instance of the post-Jimmer Fredette Brigham Young University Cougars. Hosting first round games alongside Wisconsin and BYU are the Nevada Wolfpack of the Western Athletic Conference and the Bradley Braves of the Missouri Valley Conference. Both teams finished well under .500 in the 2010/2011 season. Bradley last reached the NCAA tournament in 2006, reaching the Sweet 16, and Nevada reached the tournament in 2007, winning one game in the dance.

The field is rounded out by Wofford, which won an NCAA tournament game last season, Missouri-Kansas City, Longwood and Prairie View A&M, which lost to the Badgers 99-55 at the Kohl Center last season to open up Wisconsin’s Division I schedule. The Badgers will face one of these four teams in Madison for the opening round, with date and opponent yet to be determined.

It’s difficult to imagine the Badgers facing much of a challenge until the later rounds. The Badgers will have to cope with the losses of Jon Leuer and Keaton Nankivil, but they retain an All-American point guard in Jordan Taylor. The Badgers finished 7th in the Ken Pomeroy college basketball rankings last season, the best objective ranking system in NCAA basketball (for a glossary of advanced stats, click here. Even though some talent is leaving, the Badgers should have the talent to remain one of the best teams in the country.

Brigham Young finished 13th in the rankings, but their performance was largely due to the transcendental play of Jimmer Fredette, who went to the Sacramento Kings with the 10th pick in Thursday’s NBA Draft. Jimmer took nearly a third of BYU’s shots, putting up a tremendous 28.9 points per game and a 114.5 offensive rating. Replacing him will be tough, but BYU has put together a solid program over the last few years, repeatedly finishing in the top 50 of the KenPom ratings and appearing in the NCAA tournament for the past five years running.

The other two host teams don’t look to provide much of a challenge. Nevada hasn’t finished in the top 90 teams according to Pomeroy’s ratings since 2007 and have struggled mightily in a weak Western Athletic Conference, finishing 169th last season. Bradley finished even worse, at 177, and has been similarly incompetent, albeit in a much stronger conference in the Missouri Valley.

Of the non-hosting teams, Wofford is the most interesting. The Badgers defeated Wofford in the NCAA Tournament in 2010 by a mere four points, 53-49. Wofford appeared in the NCAA tournament once again last season, winning the Southern Conference for the second straight year, losing to BYU in the first round by eight points. Wofford may take a sharp dive in 2011/2012, as Noah Dahlman, the star behind the Terriers, has graduated. His 20.1 points per game and stunning efficiency (130.2 offensive rating using 27.2% of possessions) will be sorely missed. His absence could send the Terriers toppling back to the 200s in the Pomeroy ratings, where they languished before their recent success.

The other three teams should be non-factors. Prairie View A&M is a recent addition to Division I and is about as talented as the 44 point drubbing they received at the Kohl Center suggests, finishing 338th of 345 teams in the Pomeroy rankings. Longwood is currently an independent team, and they struggled to a 12-19 record and the 320th ranking by Pomeroy last season. Missouri-Kansas City was at least above .500 and finished 9-9 in the Summit League, but that’s only good enough for the 269th spot in the Pomeroy rankings.

At this point, it looks like the Chicago Invitational tournament should come down to Wisconsin against BYU. Anything less than a second place finish in at the Sears Centre would be a phenomenal disappointment, and the Badgers should be going into the Windy City expecting a first place finish in their first preseason tournament.