A First Time For Everything For The Big Ten Conference

The Big Ten Conference is absolutely loaded with talented basketball teams, and they just did something for the first time ever in Men's Basketball.

The Associated Press released their Top 25 rankings on Monday and the Big Ten had a conference record nine teams ranked in the Top 25.

#6 Wisconsin, #10 Iowa, #14 Rutgers, #15 Illinois, #16 Michigan, #17 Michigan State, #19 Northwestern, #21 Minnesota, #25 Ohio State all made the cut.

The Minnesota Golden Gophers took down #17 Michigan State Monday night 81-56, after beating Iowa (Who was ranked #4 at the time) in OT on Christmas Day 102-95.

The Big Ten is a gauntlet, and the Gophers' upcoming five games prove it taking on #6 Wisconsin on New Year's Eve, followed by #10 Iowa, #16 Michigan, #25 Ohio State, and #16 Michigan to kick-off 2021.

It is an impressive start for the entire conference, and the tough games night in and night out will surely mean that these teams will be battle-tested once the NCAA Tournament comes around.

Will it be a Big Ten team standing champion at the end? There hasn't been a team from the Big Ten win the championship since Tom Izzo's Michigan State Spartans in 2000. Seven different Big Ten teams have fallen in the Championship Game since 2000, we will see if that streak can be broken in 2021.

Will it be the Gophers? No. Most likely, not. But you can bet that the Gophers and every team in the Big Ten will be very fun to watch moving forward throughout this entire season.

You can catch each Gopher men's basketball game on Newstalk 1340 KROC-AM and 96.9 FM and FUN 104.3.