I have a pretty set routine in the morning from January through March. Wake up, walk to Starbucks, check mail, check Big Ten Wonk. It's really that simple. If you like your basketball with heaping portions of wit and tempo-free statistics then there really is no better place. That is of course assuming you want to know everything there is to know about the Big Televen. No one covers their niche quite like John Gasaway. So with the Big Ten tourney underway in a few hours I couldn't think of better idea than to interview the maniacal Big Ten Wonk himself.

What prompted you to launch the blog?
Fear of my first winter in the Twin Cities and curiosity as to what I'd sound like if I wrote on something daily. Now I'm in Indianapolis, I no longer fear winters, and I'm exceedingly familiar with what I sound like writing daily. But folks keep coming and this is a great time of year to write about college hoops.

How did the Big Ten win over your Big Wonk heart?
I'm a native of Springfield, Illinois, and an Illinois alum. I've lived everywhere from Atlanta to California just within the past few years and the extent of the Big Ten diaspora really is striking -- we're everywhere. Seriously, we Big Ten types will take over the  world soon. (insert maniacal laughter here.)

How many live games do you get to a year?
I have two little boys under the age of five and I'm grooming them so that, long-term, they'll come with me and I'll be a regular Kyle Whelliston, attending 100+ games yearly. But in the short-term I've been to two Butler games this year--and only because Hinkle Field House is within walking distance of the house we moved into last August.

On the other hand, through the magic of ESPN Full Court and my trusty DVR, I do indeed see a lot of hoops.

Wonk, you have a multitude of statistics to accompany your infinite wisdom. What stat do you think is the most indicative for success this time of the year?
(Nice catch on the infinite wisdom, by the way. Glad you picked up on that.) Scoring margin -- in tempo free terms we call it efficiency margin -- is a good one but of course it's not perfect. Last year teams like Kansas, Texas, Connecticut, and Ohio State had the best efficiency margins but none of them made it to the Final Four. (Though, I hasten to add, Texas and UConn lost in OT in the regional finals.) The other thing I've been looking at closely lately is the ability to make two-point shots -- and the ability to prevent your opponent from doing the same.

I know discussing officials is among your most boring topics to discuss on a hoops blog, but in conjunction with your post this week on the slowness of the conference ... don't you think officiating has played a major role?

You know, I think people misunderstand what I meant when I said "officiating" is one of "the four dullest topics" for a hoops blog. What I meant was I get tired of people saying "Team X gets all the calls" in response to every single game Team X ever wins. As a reader, I find that fatiguing. But obviously officiating plays a huge role in the quality of any game and I've written about it in that vein. It's interesting to note, though, that a lack of foul calls fan actually slow a game down. I say "can" not "does every time." In the game Illinois played at Northwestern this year, ESPN2 tracked how many seconds were left on the shot clock when the Wildcats shot the ball. Time after time the 'Cats shot the ball with more than 10 seconds remaining on the shot clock, and the announcers talked about how this was an unusually fast-paced game for Northwestern. Actually, it turned out to be one of the slowest Big Ten games of the year, because there were very few foul calls (which can often lead, directly or indirectly, to a change of possession) and almost no turnovers.

FanIQ is home to many bold predictions ... would you like to go on the record with your pick for Big Ten Tourney Champ?
Are you mad? I only do post-mortems. I look way smarter that way. I will say this: "major"-conference tournaments may be just about the toughest thing to predict. First, the best teams, by definition, have the least motivation. Second, you're predicting who's going to win a game on Sunday wherein both teams will be playing their third game in three days (maybe even their fourth in four). It's just not a normal hoops universe in which to be trotting out analysis. Probably why I love conference tournaments. They're properly chaotic.

If you'd like to go out on the line, give FanIQ your NCAA Champ? I'd settle for four teams the Wonk would like to salute?
I'd like to salute the following four teams:

Texas: for playing the most entertaining ball of the season by far. I mean, seriously, wasn't every one of their games 104-103 in 4OT's? Oh, and that Durant guy's OK, I guess.

Washington State: just when Gonzaga at long last falls off, the Cougars ensure that national analysts will nevertheless be compelled to pay attention to distant and inscrutable eastern Washington.

Florida: for sulking through a mail-it-in February and thus restoring some interest to what some thought would be a cake-walk to a repeat.

VMI: for averaging 91 possessions per game when no other team in the country averages more than 77.

The definition of an "expert" is pretty grey, but let's assume for the sake of this interview that expert pertains to one of those guys inside your TV set. Do you have a personal favorite? Does one analyst irk the Wonk more than any other?
I love it when Bill Raftery does a game alongside Jay Bilas. They both really know their hoops and they seem to genuinely enjoy each other's company. In fact, I think games done with three voices instead of two tend to work much better. With three voices an analyst's analysis can be challenged.

I'll also watch at least a few minutes of a game that I otherwise wouldn't bother with if it's being worked by Rick Majerus. And Fran Fraschilla has a special place in my heart because he uses tempo-free numbers in his call.

I'm irked whenever an announcer says a team is being "outrebounded by five." Rebound margin needed to be given the stat equivalent of a lethal injection 20 years ago.

You came out with your All Wonk Team (2.0) team yesterday. How do you decide? Balance of stats vs subjective?
This year there was such a clear consensus, myself included, on the top seven or eight players that I didn't really get a chance to shock or enrage anyone with the All-Wonk. Too bad--last year was much more wide open. And as to how I go about it, I start with what I see and work backward from there. If space aliens landed tomorrow and you pushed a sheet of the best tempo-free stats in front of them, they probably wouldn't single out, say, Alando Tucker as particularly worthy of notice. You have to see him play. People get their shorts all bunched up about using stats but in truth no one uses only stats. Anyone using only, say, scoring efficiency would say Chris Lutz should be Big Ten POY. But no one says that. The stats I use in the blog are merely an attempt to at long last give correct (tempo-free) answers to very old questions: who's making shots, who's rebounding, who's turning it over, etc. 

What Big Ten teams will make the dance in your opinion?
Ohio State, Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan State, and Illinois, with Purdue right on the edge. The Boilers could fall either way. Michigan might be able to get it done by playing Sunday. Iowa might have to win Sunday.

As a loyal Spartan fan I can't get over this bizarre season-long stat: MSU turns the ball over on 24% of their possessions ... yet their Assist/FG% (64?) is among the highest in the country. How do you reason such a discrepancy?
Easy! Superb guards and brick-handed bigs! Seriously, Walton and Neitzel are both outstanding at dishing assists. And Suton and Gray are both among the league-leaders in turnovers (speaking in tempo-free terms here, naturally). The thing with Gray (no surprise) and Suton (mild surprise) is that they've both been beastly on the boards this year--and that's been huge for your Spartans. So it's a trade-off.

Can the Spartans fix this in order to reach the Sweet 16?
Absolutely. Keep in mind "fix" here should mean "just stop turning it over at historically high levels." I don't expect the Spartans to turn into Wisconsin or Ohio State where taking care of the ball's concerned. But, as I said in the blog, Tom Izzo should think of every single turnover as costing him about 1.4 points. It adds up.

Who's your favorite Big Ten basketball player of all-time?
All-time? Not old enough to say. Tell you what, I really enjoyed watching Tim Doyle this year. The highest compliment I can pay to Mike Conley is to say he looks a lot like Tim Doyle, only talented.

You have a very unique voice through your site ... do you speak in "Wonkish" outside of the blog?
No. If I ever told my wife her idea for anything was "Edvard Munch-level horrific," I wouldn't have a roof over my head.

Thanks John for participating. As he might say, don't just mutter ineffectually; comment here  or drop by his  site the Big Ten Wonk throughout the tournament.