After Maryland women’s basketball clinched the No. 1 seed with a 71-62 win over Illinois on Saturday afternoon, the Big Ten women’s basketball tournament bracket has been released.
The 2019 Big Ten Women’s Basketball Tournament bracket. #B1GTourney pic.twitter.com/REUs0HPrNO
— Big Ten Women's Hoops (@B1Gwbball) March 3, 2019
The Terrapins will kick off their postseason Friday at noon ET on the Big Ten Network, with a game against the winner of Northwestern/Michigan State. Those two will battle it out Thursday at noon ET, also on BTN.
On Feb. 7, the Terps destroyed the Wildcats by a score of 72-57, buoyed by a 22-8 first quarter advantage. Stephanie Jones led the Terrapins in scoring, pacing the game with 16 points on 7-of-8 field goal shooting with nine rebounds.
Three weeks earlier, Maryland suffered its second loss of the season on the road against the Spartans. The Terrapins were outclassed from start to finish, falling behind by 10 points through the first quarter and ultimately losing 77-60. But while Michigan State was ranked at the time, it has lost four of its last six games to cap off the season, finishing with just a 9-9 conference record.
Iowa, Maryland’s biggest competition in winning the conference regular season title, will face the winner of the Minnesota/Indiana game at 6:30 p.m. ET. And Rutgers, which has played the past few games without head coach C. Vivian Stringer, begins its postseason play around 9 p.m. ET against Nebraska or Purdue/Illinois. The only way Maryland will face either of these teams will be in the championship game.
The tournament will kick off in Indianapolis on Wednesday, March 6, with a pair of opening-round matchups between Penn State and Wisconsin (seeds No. 12 and 13) and Purdue and Illinois (Nos. 11 and 14).