“We were hoping for the No. 1 seed actually, but the No. 2 is definitely good,” senior forward Becky Manning said. “It felt really good to beat Iowa, putting us in this position, and I think we are definitely going to have an edge up there.”

MSU head coach Rolf van de Kerkhof said that while seeding is meaningless to him, it is nice to see how the team has climbed since its No. 19 preseason ranking.

“(The ranking) shows that the players have done a fantastic job of growing up and becoming better players,” he said.

Of the seven teams in the Big Ten Tournament, Northwestern (4-13, 0-6) is seeded last, while Michigan earned the top seed.

The Spartans are confident about their chances of winning it all, based on their regular season performance.

“I think that we’re actually at a really high point in the season right now,” Manning said. “We have four straight wins, everything seems to be clicking and everybody is healthy. I think our chances look really good.”

Van de Kerkhof added that the team has to take a “one game at a time” mentality upon entering postseason play, where a loss eliminates a team from future contention.

“It’s now dead-or-alive play,” he said. “If you look back at our stats (for the season), we are the No.1 team in the Big Ten. We just have to make sure we don’t give anyone a chance to upset us.

“We just have to take care of business.”

If the Spartans get the job done against the Wildcats, they will face the winner of the Ohio State and Penn State matchup.

Previous matchups

The Spartans opened their 2007 Big Ten season against the Wildcats on Sept. 22. MSU prevailed with a 4-0 shutout.

MSU’s only Big Ten loss came to its intrastate rivals, Michigan, on Oct. 5. The Spartans lost, 2-1, in overtime.