After a rough weekend for the pups, I'm happy to see them dig deep and get a win. Kent was down 9 with 2:30 or so left and tied it. NIU scored with 5 seconds left to win.

Wow!

Wow! That's sports for ya

Must have carried over from those last few minutes at EMU...

Congrats to NIU.

Tradition has graduated at KSU.

Hmm, the west is getting stronger and the east weaker.

BG, Miami, Buffalo, and Kent are under where they have been in past seasons. Akron and Ohio are slightly above where they are usually.
Toledo, and WMU are above where they have been in past seasons. The rest of the West is so streaky that I can't tell.

NIU is one of the youngest teams in the nation. The are in the midst of a complete rebuild of their program. I think they may finally round the turn back to respectability in hoops over the next year or two. It is possible the league as a whole is down this year but the West seems to be bringing a little more balance than usual this season. I think it will carry into the next couple seasons.

BG is not off this season...we're off the last three seasons. Kent loses to us and NIU? Ouch...

(01-31-2013 09:15 AM)El Grande Flippero Wrote:  BG is not off this season...we're off the last three seasons. Kent loses to us and NIU? Ouch...

What is the deal with BG? Didn't they get a sizable donation a couple years back to pump up the hoops program?

(01-31-2013 09:23 AM)HuskieTap22 Wrote:  

(01-31-2013 09:15 AM)El Grande Flippero Wrote:  BG is not off this season...we're off the last three seasons. Kent loses to us and NIU? Ouch...

What is the deal with BG? Didn't they get a sizable donation a couple years back to pump up the hoops program?

Nope. The 10mill waits until the donor passes. My understanding is that he is in much better health than the BG hoops program.

Wow, how embarrassing for Kent State!

Not embarrassing at all. NIU played well, they shot the ball very well, and they deserved to win. KSU just isn't very good this year. Watching us play last night was like watching us play in most games this season: playing well enough to lose close games. That's what teams who are not very good do.

There are very few surprises in the MAC. The bottom teams can and will beat anyone on a given night. NIU has beaten Akron a couple of times recently until this season. OU lost to very bad EMU and Toledo teams. That's college basketball.

It still doesn't look to me like the West has gotten better. There is not as much competition at the top, which isn't even as good as it has been, and the other East teams are looking woeful. The MAC had better wake up. This slide in basketball is not good at all.

If NIU can hold on to its better players from this year I think they'll start to do better in OOC play next year. About time for NIU to stop being such an anchor for the MAC. Hopefully 1 fewer horrible team will help.

(01-31-2013 09:43 AM)H2Oville Rocket Wrote:  

(01-31-2013 09:23 AM)HuskieTap22 Wrote:  

(01-31-2013 09:15 AM)El Grande Flippero Wrote:  BG is not off this season...we're off the last three seasons. Kent loses to us and NIU? Ouch...

What is the deal with BG? Didn't they get a sizable donation a couple years back to pump up the hoops program?

Nope. The 10mill waits until the donor passes. My understanding is that he is in much better health than the BG hoops program.

Yep...the donation of $10 million was done via (most likely) a chairitable remainder trust. The donor lives off the money and the $$$ go to the recipient upon death. Which we all hope will be well into the future because the donor...Bill Frack...is supposed to be a pretty good guy by all accounts.

I consider last night embarrassing beyond expression. I did not think that we could drop so low. Our players have forgotten who and what they represent. I am sick.

We've had much better teams at KSU lose to worse teams. The best team in MAC history lost to one of the worst ever YSU (3-23) teams. It's guess embarrassment is a personal thing. I think NIU, even though they have had some horrendous games, actually looks better than they have in recent years.

(01-31-2013 01:01 PM)axeme Wrote:  We've had much better teams at KSU lose to worse teams. The best team in MAC history lost to one of the worst ever YSU (3-23) teams. It's guess embarrassment is a personal thing. I think NIU, even though they have had some horrendous games, actually looks better than they have in recent years.

Like someone else pointed out, when NIU shot well, they beat Miami and CMU. They just don't shoot well very often. They shot well against KSU, so they had a good shot at winning. Still a close call, at home. Only difference in this game is that in prior games we didn't have someone come up big when time was running out to give us a lead. This time the shot actually fell.

(01-31-2013 12:43 PM)GFlash68 Wrote:  I consider last night embarrassing beyond expression. I did not think that we could drop so low. Our players have forgotten who and what they represent. I am sick.

Embarrassing. Enough said.

NIU can be dangerous when they put a complete game together. They're still a year or two from really breaking through, but they're considerably closer than they have been in recent seasons.