Sunday’s loss to Illinois was a critical blow to the Michigan Wolverines’ goal of gaining the No. 1 seed in the Big Ten Tournament starting next week. With the Michigan State Spartans pulling away late from the Wisconsin Badgers, the Wolverines’ rival now holds a one-game lead in the conference standings with only two regular season games remaining.
Depending how this week goes, Michigan can rank anywhere from the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament to the No. 4 seed.
Before we dive into all those scenarios, here is some context: Tiebreakers are determined by round robin, and then each team’s winning percentage against the team or teams who finished the next highest in the conference.