Michigan State University Athletics
Spartans Earn Third Seed In Big Ten Tournament
2/25/2007 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Feb. 25, 2007
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EAST LANSING, Mich. - The field has been set for the 2007 Big Ten Women's Basketball Tournament presented by Xbox 360, which will take place at Conseco Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, Ind., March 1-5, with Michigan State's women's basketball team earning a No. 3 seed, the Big Ten Conference office announced Sunday evening.
Ohio State (26-2, 15-1 Big Ten), which has won the outright conference title the past two seasons and shared the championship with Michigan State in 2004-05, earned its third consecutive No. 1 seed. Purdue (25-5, 14-2) repeats as the No. 2 seed for this year's event after the second-seeded Boilermakers fell to the top-seeded Buckeyes in last year's tournament championship game, 63-60. The No. 3 seed was awarded to Michigan State (22-7, 13-3), who will face the winner of Thursday night's game between No. 6 Minnesota (15-14, 7-9) and No. 11 Northwestern (8-21, 2-14) in the second game of Friday's afternoon session of the quarterfinals.
The fifth, sixth and seventh seeds were determined Sunday by a tiebreaker as Minnesota, Penn State and Wisconsin all finished conference play at 7-9. Penn State (14-15, 7-9) earned the fifth seed by way of producing the best winning percentage between the three teams in head-to-head competition. The Lady Lions won their lone game over the Badgers and split the two-game set with the Golden Gophers this season for a combined 2-1 record. Minnesota (15-14, 7-9) is the sixth seed in the tournament as a result of its 2-2 record versus those two teams, while Wisconsin (18-11, 7-9) was given the No. 7 seed with its combined 1-2 record against those foes.
Since the first Big Ten Tournament in 1995, six teams have captured postseason titles with Purdue's five wins (1998-99-2000-03-04) leading the way. Iowa (1997-2001) and Penn State (1995-96) have each won the tournament twice, while Michigan State and Ohio State earned their first Big Ten Tournament title in 2005 and 2006, respectively. Indiana tied Purdue's 1998 squad as the lowest seed to win the event when the No. 5 Hoosiers defeated Penn State in the 2002 final for their lone title.
The 2006 tournament attendance of 38,638 and session average of 7,728 were both event records in the tournament's history. The previous marks of 37,635 and 7,527 were set in 2004. The single-session record of 9,417, which was set in 2004, still stands. The five most recent editions of the women's tournament have posted the highest attendance in the event's history, surpassing the 30,000-patron mark each year. Single-session ($12-16) and all-session ($65) tickets can be purchased at all Ticketmaster outlets, including the Conseco Fieldhouse box office, Ticketmaster charge-by-phone numbers (317-239-5151 in central Indiana) and www.ticketmaster.com.
The following attachment presents the bracket with teams, dates, times and television.
