Dec. 5, 2005

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Big Ten Best Starts: Less than a month into the season, Illinois (7-0), Michigan (5-0) and Ohio State (3-0) are the only Big Ten teams to maintain unblemished records. With a 7-0 start, the Fighting Illini won their first seven games for the third time in the last four seasons. Illinois began the 2002-03 season with eight straight wins and won its first 29 games last year. The Wolverines are off to their best start since the 1999-00 season, when Michigan opened the season with a 6-0 record. For the second consecutive year under head coach Thad Matta, the Buckeyes have opened with a 3-0 record as OSU posted a 4-0 start last season.

Weekend Tournament Recap: Iowa's Jeff Horner earned MVP honors for the second consecutive year after leading the Hawkeyes to their 20th straight Gazette Hawkeye Challenge crown. Greg Brunner and Adam Haluska also joined Horner on the All-Tournament team.

30-Plus Point Performances: With a 34-point performance against Duke on Nov. 30, Indiana's Marco Killingsworth became the fifth different player to record 30 or more points this season. Last year at this time, no Big Ten player had reached 30 points in a game and the conference finished the 2004-05 season with a total of nine 30-plus point performances. This season, Killingsworth joins Wisconsin's Alando Tucker, who tallied 38 points in a win over Eastern Kentucky on Nov. 19; Michigan State's Maurice Ager, who scored 36 against Gonzaga on Nov. 22; Purdue's Carl Landry, who followed with a 35-point outing against South Alabama on Nov. 22 and Michigan State's Paul Davis, who posted a season-high 30 against IPFW on Nov. 27.

Michigan State's Triple Threat: Michigan State currently leads the league with three players among the Big Ten's top 10 in scoring this season. Maurice Ager has tallied a scoring average of 21.7 points per game to rank second in the league, followed by teammates Paul Davis (21.0 ppg) in fourth place and Shannon Brown (16.1 ppg) tied for 10th. Indiana and Wisconsin both have a pair of players in the top 10. IU's Marco Killingsworth ranks third in the league with 21.6 points per game, while teammate Marshall Strickland is tied for seventh (16.8). Wisconsin's Alando Tucker (19.3 ppg) and Kammron Taylor (17.3 ppg) are ranked fifth and sixth, respectively.

Senior CLASS Award: Six Big Ten student-athletes - lllinois' Dee Brown, Iowa's Greg Brunner and Jeff Horner, Michigan State's Maurice Ager and Paul Davis and Minnesota's Vincent Grier - have been nominated for the fifth annual Bayer Advantage Senior CLASS Award, which is presented annually to the nation's top senior player for NCAA Division I men's and women's basketball. The CLASS award -- an acronym for Celebrating Loyalty and Achievement for Staying in School -- was developed in response to the recent trend of college basketball players leaving school early. Ten finalists will be named in February and the winner will be announced during the CBS telecast of the NCAA Men's Final Four in April.

Big Time Offense: The Big Ten is putting up big numbers this season as five schools are averaging over 75 points per game. Indiana leads the league with an average of 89.4 points per game, while Wisconsin (85.0 ppg) and Michigan State (82.1 ppg) are recording more than 80 points per game this season. Penn State (76.4) and Ohio State (76.3) follow in fourth and fifth place, respectively.

Home Sweet Home: Illinois will by vying for its 25th consecutive home win when the Illini hosts Arkansas-Little Rock on Monday. Illinois' 24-game home winning streak is the fourth-longest in the nation as Washington carries the longest streak at 29 games, followed by Gonzaga (26) and Southern Illinois (25). lllinois was the only league team to go undefeated at home last season and the Illini's last defeat occurred on Jan. 10, 2004 against Purdue. Illinois' 24-game streak still trails the Big Ten record of 53 straight home triumphs set by Michigan State from 1998 to 2002.

International Flavor: A total of 14 international players are listed on Big Ten rosters this season. Northwestern leads the Big Ten with four international players in Bernard Cote and Mohamed Hachad, who are both from Quebec, Canada, and Jean-Marc Melchior (Contern, Luxembourg) and Vedran Vukusic (Split, Croatia). The Big Ten's list of international players also include Indiana's Ben Allen (Melbourne, Australia) and Cem Cinc (Hamm, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany), Iowa's Kurt Looby (St. John's, Antigua), Michigan's Amadou Bo (Mauritania, Africa) and Jevohn Shepherd (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), Michigan State's Idong Ibok (Lagos, Nigeria) and Maurice Joseph (Montreal, Quebec, Canada) and Penn State's Milos Bogetic (Podgorica, Serbia & Montenegro), Nikola Obradovic (Belgrade, Serbia & Montenegro) and Joonas Suotamo (Espoo, Finland).

Big Ten's Grand Company: With a 27-point performance against Wake Forest last Tuesday,  Wisconsin's Alando Tucker became the latest Big Ten standout to join the league's 1,000 career point club. Tucker now has 1,029 points joining Illinois' James Augustine (1,048) and Michigan State's Maurice Ager (1,050) who also claimed their 1,000th career point this season. Eight seniors entered the 2005-06 season with more than 1,000 career points in Illinois' Dee Brown (1,447), Indiana's Marco Killingsworth (1,149), Iowa's Greg Brunner (1,145) and Jeff Horner (1,193), Michigan's Daniel Horton (1,117), Michigan State's Paul Davis (1,287) Northwestern's Vedran Vukusic (1,213) and Ohio State's Terence Dials (1,124).

2005 Big Ten/ACC Challenge Review: For the fourth time out of seven seasons, the Big Ten/ACC Challenge was won by one game as the ACC narrowly edged the Big Ten, 6-5, to win the 2005 event ... Six out of the 11 games were decided by eight points or less ... Michigan State defeated Georgia Tech, 88-86, to give the Spartans a conference-leading four wins in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge ... No. 12/12 Illinois downed North Carolina, 68-64, in Chapel Hill, while No. 14/15 Iowa defeated No. 24/21 N.C. State, 45-42. Michigan claimed a 74-53 victory over Miami (Fla.) to improve to 3-2 in the event and Ohio State defeated Virginia Tech, 69-56.

Big Ten Coaching Milestones: With a 79-63 win over Eastern Michigan on Saturday, Indiana head coach Mike Davis became the second-fastest coach in school history to compile 100 victories at Indiana. In his sixth season in Bloomington, Davis has tallied a career record of 100-68 and joined former head coach Bob Knight, who won his 100th game during his fifth season as a head coach (1975-76), while Branch McCracken obtained win No. 100 with a victory in the first game of his seventh season (1947-48). Wisconsin head coach Bo Ryan is vying for his 100th victory in Madison.  He only needs two more wins to become the fifth coach in school history to earn 100 victories after compiling a 98-38 record in his five seasons at the Badger helm.