Big Ten Basketball: Early grades for each teams 2023 offseason moves

Jan 21, 2023; University Park, Pennsylvania, USA; Nebraska Cornhuskers head coach Fred Hoiberg looks on from the bench during the second half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Bryce Jordan Center. Penn State defeated Nebraska 76-65. Mandatory Credit: Matthew OHaren-USA TODAY Sports /

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Big Ten Basketball Minnesota Golden Gophers head coach Ben Johnson Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports /

It’s widely known that Big Ten Basketball once again had an elite regular season, followed by a poor NCAA Tournament a month ago. The league got eight bids to the Big Dance but just one made it to the Sweet 16 in Michigan State. One of the early exits was the Purdue Boilermakers, who became the second-ever 1 seed to lose in the Round of 64, falling to Fairleigh Dickinson.

Coming into the offseason, there were plenty of demands for rosters to improve. A month into the offseason, a few Big Ten teams got better, some got worse on paper and others have stayed the same. But how does that work overall? Here’s a current snapshot of Big Ten Basketball early in May, giving an offseason grade to each program, using the standings from last season.

14. Minnesota Golden Gophers – Grade: F

The Gophers went 2-17 in conference play this past and there’s a legit case that they got worse. They lost two of their three best players this offseason in Jamison Battle and Ta’Lon Cooper and replaced them with a trio of underwhelming transfers. One is Jack Smith, who played just 40 minutes combined as a freshman at Washington State.

The other two do have potential in Elijah Hawkins and Mike Mitchell, who both averaged at least 11 ppg, 3.5 rpg, and 4.0 apg at Howard and Pepperdine respectively. But they’re not good defenders and will need to replicate their previous production just to be as good as last season. At best, you can say they’re as good as last season, which means nothing since they were in last place.

13. Ohio State Buckeyes – Grade: B

For a team that finished next to last in the Big Ten Basketball standings and lost its best player (Brice Sensabaugh) to the NBA Draft, the Buckeyes didn’t panic. They added a pair of role players (Dale Bonner and Evan Mahaffey), along with Jamison Battle, a double-digit scorer from Minnesota who’ll start on the wings.

The most important thing for Ohio State is that they were able to keep its young core outside of Sensabaugh. Bruce Thornton is back as a sophomore, along with an incoming top-10 recruiting class. If you believed that last year was a fluke, they’ll be able to make a climb back up the standings.

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