Only four games separate third place from eleventh place in the Big Ten standings, and only five games separate second from eleventh.

That shows that these teams are so equal that any team can win any game on any night in league play.

There’s six teams that are a half a game from each other, and one loss can put a team from fifth to tenth. That’s huge when seeding comes around for the Big Ten Tournament in a little over a month.

Your team can go from a first-round bye, to playing an equal in the first round and having a shot at getting knocked out early.

That can ruin NCAA Tournament hopes for teams on the bubble.

Outside of Ohio State and Michigan State, every team appears to be evenly matched. I don’t think anyone outside of those two will win the regular season championship, but, in March when the Big Ten Tournament starts, I wouldn’t be surprised if either or both of those two teams gets knocked off.

This conference is just so tight and every loss matters.

I think there’s five guaranteed teams that get into the NCAA Tournament—Ohio State, Michigan State, Michigan, Wisconsin and Indiana—but four others still have a realistic shot. Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota and Northwestern are on the bubble in my mind right now, with Illinois being slightly in and the other three on the outside looking in if the tournament started today.

Luckily for those teams, there’s still a month left to the season.

With the conference being so even, all it will take is for a few of these bubble teams to get on a run to play their way into the NCAA Tournament.

I think that this last month of Big Ten basketball will be one of the greatest months the conference has ever seen. The Big Ten Tournament may be the best four days of basketball this tournament has ever had.

Any team outside of Nebraska, Iowa and Penn State can win the tournament and can control their own postseason destiny.

The play will be even more elevated as so many teams can sniff the top of the mountain and can earn some quality wins to improve their seeding in the NCAA Tournament, or even just play their way into the big dance.

Buckle up, Big Ten basketball fans, because this next month is going to be exciting as we see who can step it up at the right time of the year.