Nebraska Basketball had and impressive non-conference season. What does the Cornhuskers have to do to ensure they hear their name called come Selection Sunday?
The teams who will be playing in the NCAA tournament are starting to separate themselves from the pack. By this point in the season, NCAA tournament at large hopefuls should already have a resume that is starting to build towards the tournament. If a team has a empty resume at this point in the season, their chances of an at large are going to be minimal. The goal of the conference season, if you play in a major conference, should be to improve on your NCAA tournament resume. Trying to build a resume through conference games is often a futile effort.
The Nebraska Cornhuskers are one of the teams who have a resume worthy of an NCAA tournament bid. The Huskers are one of the few teams, and only power conference team to never win an NCAA tournament game. This year if they continue to play as they have early in the year, they will have a chance to grab that first win.
Over the past week Nebraska did not do anything to help their case. The Huskers lost both of their games to other potential tournament qualifiers at Maryland and at Iowa. When Nebraska returned home to face bottom feeder Penn State, the Huskers were tight, and the Nittany Lions were able to keep that game much closer than it should be.
The important thing is that Nebraska did not lose the game to Penn State, and escaped with a six-point victory. The fans in Lincoln want nothing more than for a team to make the tournament and win their first game. Nebraska can still improve their resume to ensure that they receive a bid in March. If the Huskers do a few things, they will not have to stress too much come selection Sunday.