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Surprised to see no game thread yet for this one.

First, Northern Ill. is not good (5-11, 1-4), so it's a game we should win.

Second, size should not be an issue. Of the 9 guys who play the most, they have 1 guy 6'10, 200 (Winther, 9.2 points, 5.4 boards in 25 minutes) and 1 guy 6'8, 240 (Hassan Washington, 3.9 points, 2.0 boards in 13 minutes). Most of the rest of their players are between 6'3 and 6'5.

Over 45% of their shots are from 3, but as a team they only shoot it at 32%. Ducommun (6'4) and Valentine (6'3) each take about 7 per game at 31% and 33%. Walters (6'5) is their best shooter at 42% but he only takes 2 per game. The other player to watch is Ituka (6'1) who takes around 4 per game at 34%.

On the plus side, they rebound pretty well, at +3.7 per game and they shoot more free throws than their opponents. They do turn the ball over a lot (15.8 per game) vs causing 12.8 per game. They only have 27 blocks as a team in 16 games. That's a low number. We are not a great shot-blocking team but we have 42 in 18 games.

We will see 2 familiar faces on the sidelines as assistant coaches. Antwon Jackson was an assistant to DK and Jacob Kurtz was an assistant to Matt McCall.

Sports-Reference.com has a subtle stats that calculate how much of a team's minutes and scoring returns from the previous year. (For us, it's 24.2% of minutes played and 18.0% of scoring.) For NIU MBB, that stat isn't even there, because THEIR ENTIRE ROSTER is brand new. Insane.

They're pretty young, with only one senior, a bunch of freshmen, and bunch of transfers. At least we retained a couple starters.
https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/sc ... /2026.html

I know almost nothing about their program, so I wondered if the turnover was due to a coaching change. Nope. Rashon Burno is in year 5 there, but with his .314 overall win percentage, DNQ for the MAC Tourney in 3 of his 4, and the conference change coming this offseason, he might find himself out of a job soon.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashon_Burno
https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/co ... rno-1.html

Road wins aren't easy but this is one we need to get.

A couple other things I noticed...
- NIU lost a game in November, apparently due to weather, and Bellarmine couldn't/wouldn't make the trip.
- NIU has one road win, 76-59 at Loyola Chicago. LoChi is pretty bad this season.

More on the NIU MBB program...

MAC member since: 1975, but they had an 11-year stretch in the 80s and 90s where they played elsewhere. Rejoined in 1997.

MAC titles, regular season (outright or divisional): 3 (last 2020, when they tied for the West Division lead, but were the 4 seed in the tourney)
MAC tournament (began in 1980) titles: 1 (1982)

NCAA Tournament appearances: 3 (0-3 record)
Last bid: 1996 (when they got the auto-bid from the Midwestern Collegiate Conference, now known as the Horizon)
Farthest run: bounced in first round each year

We've faced them three times before, and are 3-0
https://umasshoops.com/wiki/doku.php?id ... n_illinois

Current coach: Rashon Burno (5th season)
Played for Bob Hurley at St. Anthony's, then at DePaul. D-I assistant since 2010, most recently for Bobby Hurley at ASU.
As mentioned above, hasn't gone well at NIU. Curious to know why the full roster turnover, but don't have enough time to dig into it.

NIU's last 4 seasons (all under Burno):
2021-22: 9-21 / 6-14 (tied for 9th, DNQ)
2022-23: 13-19 / 9-9 (7th, bounced easily in MAC Quarters)
2023-24: 11-20 / 5-13 (11th of 12, DNQ)
2024-25: 6-25 / 2-16 (12th of 12, DNQ)

So far this year:
5-11 overall but that includes 2 wins over sub-D-I
1-4 in the MAC, the lone W coming in a 74-73 home win over also-rebuilding Central Michigan. NIU tipped in the game winner at the buzzer.
They hung within 4 at Kent State, but other MAC games have been double-digit losses.
https://niuhuskies.com/sports/mens-basketball/schedule

With their poor performances, they're only averaging 959 in their home game attendance this season.

NIU played one of their sub-D-I games against East-West University. If you've heard of 'em, you must live/work near their buildings in downtown Chicago. https://www.eastwest.edu/ In sports they play as an independent within the United States Collegiate Athletic Association. They don't even have a schedule on their website. https://www.eastwest.edu/phantoms-basketball/

In this episode of "Just Being Frank", he spends some time talking about Danny and Parker. He also mentions Cobb, a 6-foot guard for UNI who he calls a major disruptor on D. We have had some struggles with the press so I would assume that this is an area the team has worked on for this game.

https://umassathletics.com/sports/2018/ ... cs-podcast Scroll down to season 3, episode 13.

I haven't seen any official spread yet, but 3 or 4 sites have predicted us winning by 6+. I hope they're right.

69MG wrote: Fri Jan 16, 2026 5:39 pm In this episode of "Just Being Frank", he spends some time talking about Danny and Parker. He also mentions Cobb, a 6-foot guard for UNI who he calls a major disruptor on D. We have had some struggles with the press so I would assume that this is an area the team has worked on for this game.

https://umassathletics.com/sports/2018/ ... cs-podcast Scroll down to season 3, episode 13.

I haven't seen any official spread yet, but 3 or 4 sites have predicted us winning by 6+. I hope they're right.

-8.5 UMass

I expect a big win today

Seems like a good opportunity to get on a much needed roll and continue to improve as a second half team.

stevemaz wrote: Sat Jan 17, 2026 7:58 am I expect a big win today

Must win to save face at least

Big win? We got another on our hands.

Parker
Placide
Brown
Wimbley
Damjanac

What kind of lineup is this? What are we doing. We’re getting 100% outplayed by Northern Illinois, the worst team in the conference. This is a disgrace.

Is Clerc hurt?

Zero coaching. We fucking suck.

We’re shooting 19%!!!!

Frank is just going to pout and make the players figure it out for themselves.

Just listening but sounds very disappointing so far. Wake UP guys!!

Steve81 wrote: Sat Jan 17, 2026 3:40 pm Just listening but sounds very disappointing so far. Wake UP guys!!

Don’t worry you’ll hear some inspirational bullshit quote from Bamford after the game and donate another thousand.