By Pat Harty

IOWA CITY, Iowa – After watching his team lose to Indiana 83-78 on Wednesday in Bloomington, Indiana, Penn State men’s basketball coach Mike Rhoades made it abundantly clear how he feels about the Big Ten Tournament’s new format in which only the top 15 teams qualify for the event.

The bottom three teams in the 18-team conference standings will be left at home to wonder what could have been.

Penn State is in real danger of being among the bottom three teams as it fell to 5-13 in Big Ten play with the loss at Indiana.

Penn State’s final two regular seasons games are against Maryland and Wisconsin, both of whom are nationally ranked.

Here is Rhoades’ statement in which he criticized the new format:

“I think it’s horses—, to be honest with you.

Everybody bangs their chest about student-athlete experience. And we’re in the Big Ten and we’re keeping three teams out of it? And you’ve seen how we played today. We had a tough stretch. We had a crazy schedule, too, and I don’t think you take away experiences from student-athletes. I think it’s ridiculous. I think it’s not professional.

The leaders got to do a better job talking that through because last year we went to the tournament and we beat a team, and if we have one box out, we beat Indiana. Now we win two games. You don’t think we can do that this year if we went?

There’s a lot of hypocrites right now in college athletics when it comes to we want to take care of the student-athletes, the student-athlete experience. And then we’re in the Big Ten and we’re keeping people out of it. We didn’t even do that in Division III when I was at Randolph-Macon. Not a fan of it.

Even if I was at the top three in the league, I think you never take away experiences and opportunities for young people. Us adults should be on top of that. I’ll probably get in trouble for saying that.”

Iowa head coach Fran McCaffery held a zoom with the media Thursday morning and was asked where he stood on this issue.

The Hawkeyes, with a 6-11 record in conference play, are also in danger of being one of the three teams left out of the conference tournament.

Iowa’s next game is Friday at Northwestern, which is also 6-11 in conference play and fighting to stay out of the bottom three spots in the standings.

“I don’t understand the reasoning for it,” Fran McCaffery said. “There are so many factors that happen throughout the course of the season that would impact your ability to potentially make the tournament or not. Let’s say, for example, you’ve got some injured guys and they become healthy again. You lose some games and then you get it turned around but you don’t have enough.

“I think everybody that signs to play in the Big Ten should have an opportunity to play in the Big Ten Tournament. It’s not that much more money. It’s not that much more planning. I just don’t understand the reasoning behind it. It makes no sense.”

Fran McCaffery brings up a good point about opportunity, and he obviously is speaking from experience about the injury factor since his team has been greatly impacted by injuries this season, most notably the season-ending finger injury to sophomore forward Owen Freeman, who was leading the team in scoring (16.7) rebounding (6.7) and blocks (35) when he was lost for the season in early February.

Graduate point guard Drew Thelwell also has been hobbled by an ankle injury while freshman forward Cooper Koch has missed most of the season due to a health issue.

The flipside to this argument is that why should everybody get a participation trophy? This new format also helps to create some drama and incentive for teams that normally wouldn’t have much of either at this stage of the season.

For example, Iowa and Northwestern will play Friday in Evanston with the threat of not making the conference tournament an issue for both teams.

Under the previous format, every team in the Big Ten made the conference tournament, even as the field expanded from 11 to 14 teams during the 2010s.

But with the addition of four more schools from the Pac-12 last summer to bring the number of schools in the conference to 18, the Big Ten adjusted its format and added a third game to the first day of the tournament.

Problems or disagreements of this kind were bound to occur when the Big Ten expanded to 18 teams.

That’s a lot of teams to host for a postseason tournament, and apparently too many according to the Big Ten Conference.

A cynic might say that Fran McCaffery and Mike Rhoades wouldn’t be concerned about the new format if their teams were having a better season, and that all they’re really doing is whining and distracting.

And while maybe there is some truth to that, both head coaches also bring up some good points, namely that college athletics is about creating opportunities for the student-athletes.

What this really comes down to is the never-ending thirst for more television revenue is the driving force behind conference expansion, and conference expansion is the reason why three teams will be left out of the Big Ten Tournament moving forward.

The power and influence of television and streaming has the final say in everything these days, and if that means keeping three teams from competing in the Big Ten Tournament, then so be it.

Because it’s more about the Benjamins than the Jimmys and Joes.

Iowa (15-13, 6-11) vs. Northwestern (15-13, 6-11)

When: Friday, 8 p.m.

Where: Evanston, Illinois, Welsh-Ryan Arena (7,039)

TV: FS1

Radio: Hawkeye Radio Network

All-time series: The Hawkeyes are 121-61 all-time against Northwestern, including winning 11 of the last 12 games. Iowa defeated the Wildcats 80-79 in the first meeting this season in both team’s Big Ten opener.

Iowa head coach Fran McCaffery is 18-8 all-time against Northwestern