The Nebraska women’s basketball team earned the No. 6 seed in the upcoming Big Ten Tournament to be played at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, March 6-10.
The Huskers, who won three of their final four regular-season conference games to finish the year with a 9-9 league mark, claimed the No. 6 seed officially after Minnesota defeated Michigan State 81-63 on Sunday afternoon.
Nebraska finished in a four-way tie for sixth in the final league standings, but held the collective tiebreakers over Minnesota, Michigan State and Northwestern. The Huskers went 3-1 against that group of teams with wins over ranked Minnesota and Michigan State squads while splitting two games with Northwestern.
Maryland (15-3) won the Big Ten regular-season title, while Iowa and Rutgers tied for second (13-5). Michigan claimed the No. 4 seed at 11-7, while Ohio State took the No. 5 seed at 10-8. The Huskers defeated both Ohio State and Michigan during the regular season, but went 0-5 against the Big Ten’s top three teams with two losses apiece to No. 8 Maryland and No. 12 Iowa.
The Huskers earned a first-round bye at the Big Ten Tournament and will open play on Thursday, March 7 at approximately 7:45 p.m central time. Nebraska will play the last of four games on Thursday and will face the winner of Wednesday’s 3 p.m. (CT) game between No. 11 seed Purdue and No. 14 seed Illinois. Nebraska swept the season series with Purdue and defeated Illinois in Champaign.
Tournament action begins on Wednesday, March 6 with No. 12 Penn State taking on No. 13 Wisconsin at 12:30 p.m. (CT), followed by the game between the Boilermakers and Fighting Illini.
Thursday’s second round tips with No. 8 Northwestern facing No. 9 Michigan State at 11 a.m. (CT), followed by No. 5 Ohio State facing the winner of the Penn State/Wisconsin. Thursday’s evening session begins with No. 7 seed Minnesota battling No. 10 seed Indiana at 5:30 p.m.
All six first- and second-round games will be televised live by BTN. In fact, BTN will carry each of the first 12 games (first round through semifinals). All 12 games will also be available on BTN2Go and the FOX Sports app.
If the Huskers can advance, they would face No. 3 seed Rutgers in Friday’s last quarterfinal game, which would tip at approximately 7:45 p.m. (CT) – or 25 minutes after the conclusion of the evening session’s first game.
The Big Ten semifinals are set for 4 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 9, before the championship game tips on Sunday at 5 p.m. (CT). The title game will be televised by ESPN2 and available on the ESPN app.