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Big Ten basketball: 5 bold predictions for 2020-2021 NCAA basketball season

By Cody Williams

Feb 29, 2020; Iowa City, Iowa, USA; Iowa Hawkeyes center Luka Garza (55) reacts during the second half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 29, 2020; Iowa City, Iowa, USA; Iowa Hawkeyes center Luka Garza (55) reacts during the second half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeffrey Becker-USA TODAY Sports /
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Big Ten basketball predictions
Iowa Hawkeyes (Mandatory Credit: Mike Carter-USA TODAY Sports) /

Big Ten basketball predictions as there could be a shakeup at the top of the conference in the 2020-2021 season with Michigan State going through changes.

Fans of Big Ten basketball are likely still licking their wounds over the fact that last year’s NCAA Tournament was canceled. For quite a while, the conference has been looking for a National Championship to put in the trophy case and it seemed like they were in line to potentially do it. The good new, however, is that they should have the same opportunity before them in the 2020-2021 season.

With National Player of the Year favorite Luka Garza and the Iowa Hawkeyes, a stacked Illinois Fighting Illini roster, perennial contenders Michigan State and Wisconsin looming and a handful of frisky mid-tier teams in the conference, Big Ten basketball figures to be an outright force this year that could very well compete to be the best league in the country.

As for the league itself, though, we’re going to look at how things are doing to play out as we make our Big Ten basketball predictions for the 2020-2021 season, going through various awards, predicted standings and much more.

Big Ten basketball Player of the Year: Luka Garza, F, Iowa

In all honesty, this was a pretty easy call. Whenever you have a player who is among the favorites to win National Player of the Year coming into the season, it’s pretty much a foregone conclusion that they could win conference player of the year. So as Iowa star Luka Garza returns for his senior season, he’s close to a lock to win Big Ten Player of the Year already.

Garza was an absolute monster for the Hawkeyes last season en route to winning the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award as a junior. The 6-foot-11 forward put up 23.9 points per game while shooting over 54 percent from the field and 35.8 percent from 3-point range. Moreover, he put up 9.8 rebounds and 1.8 blocks per game.

With Garza on the floor, there isn’t anyone in the conference who can match up with him, which is why he was able to produce at the clip he did a year ago. And that scenario hasn’t changed for him. Moreover, the Iowa roster around him is arguably better than it was last season, meaning the team should be more successful.

Now having even more team success likely working in his favor, if Garza is even the same player that he was last year, it would be an absolute stunner if he wasn’t the Big Ten Player of the Year. And if he takes another step forward, he’ll run away with the award.