Good Morning, Illini Nation: About that Big Ten schedule

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Sign up for our daily basketball newsletter here Welcome to Good Morning, Illini Nation, your daily dose of college basketball news from Illini beat writer and AP Top 25 voter Scott Richey.

Hell offer up insights every morning on Brad Underwoods team and college basketball at large: We're inside of 50 days and counting to the start of the 2024-25 season the 50th day was actually Sunday and we're still waiting on a completed Big Ten schedule.

If the release of said information tracks with last year, we're looking at this week.

None too soon if you ask me.

Who each team will play in the new expanded 18-team league is known, of course.

Has been since May 1.

Quite a bit has changed since then across the conference.

At Illinois, those changes have included the additions of Tomislav Ivisic, Ben Humrichous, Kaspar Jakucionis and Will Riley to the roster.

Arguably four starters right there.

The rest of the league is in a similar spot.

The way Illinois' Big Ten slate of games was viewed on May 1 has changed.

For a refresher, it looks like this: The double plays aren't bad.

Michigan State is the toughest of that bunch and is one of three Big Ten teams ranked ahead of Illinois (Purdue and Rutgers the others) in Bart Torvik's 2024-25 projections .

Northwestern, like the Spartans, is basically relying on the players it's running back.

Wisconsin made some moves in the transfer portal but didn't, to me, add any serious game changer.

Single plays at home against Maryland, Purdue, UCLA and USC are a positive.

Only getting Indiana, Michigan and Rutgers on the road is a little rough.

Especially Rutgers.

That's a team that's going to rely heavily on a pair of five-star freshmen.

Taking them down in Champaign would have been an easier proposition than at the "Trapezoid of Terror." The teams that have made what I'd consider important post-May 1 moves, though, are Ohio State, Nebraska, Washington and Oregon.

The Buckeyes landed former five-star recruit Sean Stewart from Duke and then got a veteran guard in Ques Glover as a walk-on (plus NLI) once Taison Chatman went down with a torn ACL in a summer workout.

Nebraska also landed a necessary post-injury piece, with UCLA transfer Berke Buyuktuncel giving the Cornhuskers some of the stretch big vibes they would have missed with Rienk Mast out of the season.

New Washington coach Danny Sprinkle did most of his most important roster work after May 1.

Getting Great Osobor to continue to follow him from Montana State to Utah State and now to the Huskies was a big (expensive) deal.

And Oregon's Dana Altman seriously bolstered his roster with transfers T.J.

Bamba and Supreme Cook while also flipping four-star guard Jamari Phillips from Arizona.

A lot to digest in the four-plus months since the Big Ten announced who was playing whom in 2024-25.

Now, the wait continues to see when..

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