UIC played Loyola tonight. I don't know who won. It was a matchup of perennial Horizon League also-rans and frequent cellar-dwellers. I wanted to go. But it started at 7pm, not 7:30, so I wouldn't have been able to be on time for tipoff in Rogers Park.
Chicago has four schools with Division I men's basketball teams. Why are they all so bad?
The Big East Conference has 16 member schools. Nine of these schools are in major cities, and another two are in New Jersey, less than 30 miles from midtown Manhattan. Nearly all of them are competitive in basketball. How does Chicago have four basketball teams that are consistently mediocre or terrible? Forget a college football playoff, President Obama. This is the issue you should investigate!
The Big East's urban schools are: U of Cincinnati, DePaul U., Georgetown U., U of Louisville, Marquette U., U of Pittsburgh, St. John's U., U of South Florida, and Villanova U. I didn't count Providence College or Syracuse University because those are smaller cities. Rutgers U. and Seton Hall U. are in New Jersey.
New York has St. John's, Manhattan and Hofstra. Philadelphia has Villanova, Temple and Penn. Boston has Boston College and Harvard. Washington has Georgetown, George Washington U. and George Mason U. Los Angeles has UCLA. (USC is terrible.) San Francisco has Stanford and Cal. It's just a shame, I think, that for such a great sports town, the men's college basketball programs receive scant media attention and end up with very poor recruiting classes. The schools' athletic programs can't or won't commit the resources to compete with their conference rivals. Loyola's and UIC's Horizon League rivals are mostly small urban schools like themselves. How hard could it be to beat these mid-major or non-major squads? To Northwestern's credit, the Wildcats seem to be on the road to improvement. Still mediocre this year, but they did sweep Michigan and split with Illinois.
When was the last time any of these four went to the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament? Famously, Northwestern has never been invited. DePaul, Loyola, UIC and Northwestern are barely noticeable in the winter, competing with the Bears (even long after their season is over), the Bulls, Blackhawks, and Cubs and White Sox (before their seasons begin) for media and fan attention in the big city.
Northwestern will sell out its 8117-seat Welsh-Ryan Arena if it is playing a Big Ten opponent with many alumni in the area. Other than those dates, the turnout is disappointing for its games and downright embarrassing for the other three teams. DePaul's fall from grace is particularly disappointing. The Rosemont Horizon (now Allstate Arena) was built for DePaul men's basketball in 1980 and 1981, after the Blue Demons had outgrown their aging on-campus dump, Alumni Hall. (Alumni Hall no longer stands.) Now DePaul may have a few thousand fans rattling around a stadium that seats nearly 20,000. It is the third tenant after the Chicago Wolves (minor-league hockey) and Chicago Sky (women's hoops). Students can take a free bus from the Lincoln Park campus. Unfortunately parking and tickets are awfully pricey for average fans. DePaul's tickets run $20-$100 for most games. Northwestern sells all individual Big Ten tickets for $20. Loyola and UIC charge less--about $12-$15. I'm not going to look up DePaul's records, but I suspect the Blue Demons have no NCAA tournament wins in the past decade.
Even when the Bulls and Blackhawks were awful, which was for most of the past decade, Chicago sports fans barely gave our college basketball teams a second look. They deserve better. And as fans, so do we.
Showing posts with label Northwestern Wildcats. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Northwestern Wildcats. Show all posts
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Northwestern 77, Indiana 75
Indiana at Northwestern
Jan. 28, 2009 - tipoff 7:30
Welsh-Ryan Arena, Evanston
Both teams had a lot at stake in this game. Northwestern is in a serious run for its first-ever NCAA tournament bid. Indiana, 0-6 Big Ten before the game, was fighting for its first Big Ten win of the season--unheard of for the once-proud basketball power. Thanks to a significant contingent of local Indiana fans, the game is typically a sellout, but that was not the case last night. (Announced 5126 out of 8117 seats--that sounds awfully low.) Somehow my seats ended up among a sea of Indiana fans. I ordered them from the Northwestern ticket office. How did NU know? I didn't click "IU." Strange. The arena is has half as many seats as a normal basketball arena. We had center court, Row BBB, near the top of the house. The single-lettered rows do not go to Z, thank G-d. It would be more accurate to say we were in Row 33 than Row 54. Pretty high, but not as bad as seats in Bloomington, Indiana's Assembly Hall. Come to think of it, I don't think it's possible to have seats as bad as in Bloomington's Assembly Hall. The main seating bowl has about 45 rows, and the last 10 or 20 rows need to deal with the balcony overhang. The balcony has about 10 rows and is much too high. The place is a 60's-era dump in dire need of being replaced. As for Welsh-Ryan Arena, I really can't complain other than the fact that most rows are bleachers rather than individual seats. (Northwestern calls individual seats "Purple Preferred" and reserves those for season tickets.) And the scoreboard obviously hasn't changed since I was a kid. It's crying out for a video board, but Northwestern probably just doesn't want to commit the money. It's using the same lame graphics on its tired LED board that probably went up about 25 years ago. It's Lite-Brite!
Could either team find an inside game? I think the only inside shots were off rebounds or breakaway baskets. If either team can perfect an inside game, it's on to something. Dozens of three-point field goal attempts, many successful. The team that committed the fewest mistakes won, and surprisingly, that turned out to be Northwestern. I was sad for IU and happy for Northwestern. Maybe the Wildcats are on to something. It would be nice to have a strong basketball team in Evanston. Every other school in the Big Ten except for Penn State has had a strong men's basketball team within the last decade. It just couldn't be that hard. It requires a financial commitment to recruiting and coaching. Yes, Northwestern is a small school and the only private school in the Big Ten. Still, it should be able to manage a couple of blue-chip recruits a year. That's all it takes.
Jan. 28, 2009 - tipoff 7:30
Welsh-Ryan Arena, Evanston
Both teams had a lot at stake in this game. Northwestern is in a serious run for its first-ever NCAA tournament bid. Indiana, 0-6 Big Ten before the game, was fighting for its first Big Ten win of the season--unheard of for the once-proud basketball power. Thanks to a significant contingent of local Indiana fans, the game is typically a sellout, but that was not the case last night. (Announced 5126 out of 8117 seats--that sounds awfully low.) Somehow my seats ended up among a sea of Indiana fans. I ordered them from the Northwestern ticket office. How did NU know? I didn't click "IU." Strange. The arena is has half as many seats as a normal basketball arena. We had center court, Row BBB, near the top of the house. The single-lettered rows do not go to Z, thank G-d. It would be more accurate to say we were in Row 33 than Row 54. Pretty high, but not as bad as seats in Bloomington, Indiana's Assembly Hall. Come to think of it, I don't think it's possible to have seats as bad as in Bloomington's Assembly Hall. The main seating bowl has about 45 rows, and the last 10 or 20 rows need to deal with the balcony overhang. The balcony has about 10 rows and is much too high. The place is a 60's-era dump in dire need of being replaced. As for Welsh-Ryan Arena, I really can't complain other than the fact that most rows are bleachers rather than individual seats. (Northwestern calls individual seats "Purple Preferred" and reserves those for season tickets.) And the scoreboard obviously hasn't changed since I was a kid. It's crying out for a video board, but Northwestern probably just doesn't want to commit the money. It's using the same lame graphics on its tired LED board that probably went up about 25 years ago. It's Lite-Brite!
Could either team find an inside game? I think the only inside shots were off rebounds or breakaway baskets. If either team can perfect an inside game, it's on to something. Dozens of three-point field goal attempts, many successful. The team that committed the fewest mistakes won, and surprisingly, that turned out to be Northwestern. I was sad for IU and happy for Northwestern. Maybe the Wildcats are on to something. It would be nice to have a strong basketball team in Evanston. Every other school in the Big Ten except for Penn State has had a strong men's basketball team within the last decade. It just couldn't be that hard. It requires a financial commitment to recruiting and coaching. Yes, Northwestern is a small school and the only private school in the Big Ten. Still, it should be able to manage a couple of blue-chip recruits a year. That's all it takes.
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