Northwestern University Athletics
The Skip Report: Real Resolve
12/31/2017 11:29:00 AM | Men's Basketball
By Skip Myslenski
NUsports.com Special Contributor
Ten things as the 'Cats prepare to resume Big Ten play Tuesday night at Allstate against Nebraska…
1. The moment arrived early in the second half of Northwestern's Saturday matinee with Brown, and it resembled many others that feature athletic young men pursuing a loose ball. But when this play ended one of them did not get up, and it was the point guard Bryant McIntosh. His left knee had been rolled by Bears' guard Zach Hunsaker, and he was damaged enough that he would need help getting up and making his way to the locker room. He would not reappear.
"We don't know much about him. I know you're going to ask," Chris Collins would say in his opening post-game statement. "It's a little bit of a knee issue. We're hoping for the best. But it would be stupid for me to try to say what it is. We just don't know. We've got to get with the medical staff to figure out the extent. Hopefully, you just pray for a guy like that who's a senior that it's not something that's going to cost him an extended amount of time."
2. The 'Cats were down three as McIntosh went to the locker room at 17:14 and here they were also without Vic Law, who was on the bench with four fouls. Seventy-four seconds later, as the media time out was called, their deficit was one and their aim was clear. "We talked about digging in, getting stops, being aggressive, not overreacting and panicking," remembered Collins, who spoke first and then gave way to his players.
"There were really strong voices," he said of them. "Scottie (Lindsey) had good things to say. Dererk (Pardon) had some good things to say. Vic. Our veteran guys really stepped up. I liked what I saw in our guys' eyes. They were determined, and they came out and backed it up."
"It was basically, 'Don't panic. If we play defense the game will come to us,'" Pardon would later add.
"We just wanted to get back to playing Northwestern basketball," concluded the junior guard Jordan Ash. "We felt like we weren't fighting like we should have been. We wanted to pick up our effort and energy."
3. Just 30 seconds after that time out, and despite their best intentions, the 'Cats were down seven after a three from the right wing by Brown guard Brandon Anderson. "A lot of teams could have folded at that moment," Collins would say, but his team would not. They would instead exhibit the resolve they had just discussed and with that came a dunk by Lindsey, a block by Pardon, which sprung a fast break that ended with an Ash three from the left corner.
"There's no question our defense picked up," Collins would say of this stretch, which irrevocably turned this game the 'Cats way.
4. The 'Cats holy trinity, of course, has long been Law, Lindsey and McIntosh. But here, in the belly of this game, they could only lean on one of them, and still they found a way to swing momentum and to take it over. They did that with Pardon, who would go six-of-seven from the field and six-of-eight from the line to finish with 18 points and eight boards, and they did that with Skelly, who hit his only two shots and ended with six points, four boards and three blocks. They got contributions too from center Barret Benson (six points) and forward Aaron Falzon (seven), and then there was the work of their other triumvirate, the guards Ash, Brown and Anthony Gaines.
"I'm seeing their confidence really grow," Collins would say when asked about the 33 points his bench contributed on this day. "I'm seeing growth in Ash. I'm seeing growth in Isiah Brown. I'm seeing growth in Gaines. I'm seeing growth in Barret Benson. Those guys are getting better, and certainly you need all your guys when you get into the Big Ten."
"Early in the season," Ash would soon say, "we were trying to find our roles a little bit and that kind of hurt us in some games. But I'd say the last five games, we've picked it up and tried to help the team anyway we can."
5. The 'Cats would be without their choreographer for nearly all of the second half, and foul trouble would limit the minutes of Law (17) and Lindsey (26), and still they would win 22. "You're down seven and Bryant goes down and there's real adversity," Collins later reflected. You kind of find out what's in your group. I thought we stayed poised and disciplined."
6. That was true enough. But even here, as has happened before in this season, Law and Lindsey did get themselves into that foul trouble. "They're so important with their length and their versatility, we need them to be smart and not pick up the cheap fouls to where we're managing fouls through the whole game," Collins said of this issue.
7. Then, of course, there was the McIntosh injury. "I don't even want to think about that right now," Collins would say when asked who would be his point if that injury sidelined his senior, but then he added this.
"It would be by committee," he added. "Nobody's going to be able to do what Bryant does, and a lot of what we do is built around him running the team and having the ball. You saw Jordan out there doing it. You saw Isiah out there doing it. That puts even more on Vic and Scottie, to become more floor generals and play makers as well. If we have to play without Bryant, it's something we're going to have to do by committee."
8. Ash, the junior, shot two-of-six on Saturday and finished with five points, four rebounds, two assists and two turnovers. Brown, the sophomore, shot two-of-five and finished with four points, four rebounds, three assists and one turnover. Gaines, the first year, shot five-of-11 and finished with 11 points, five rebounds, and two assists.
That is how the committee did against the Bears.
9. "They all have different skill sets," Collins would say when asked about this, his team's second triumvirate. "Ultimately, as a coach, you try to make the most out of the group you have. You try to bring out the best in what Jordan Ash can do with his energy and his defense. What I like about him is he's really getting confident offensively, which is helping him. He's shooting the ball better, he's making plays. You know with Isiah you've got an energy guy who can come in and score the ball. And then Gaines is just an emerging, outstanding player. As we move forward with our program, he's going to be a key guy as he continues to get experience and improve. He can do a little bit of everything out there."
"I think with Gaines, being a freshman, you have to try and bring energy," said Ash, offering his own scouting report. "But he's different. He had a college-ready body coming in, so he's able to drive to the basket. He's still learning. But he's definitely helping us on both ends. Isiah's a guy who can be a spark offensively off the bench. That's what he's been since he got here and he's getting better in that role. For me, first be a defensive player, then take my shots when they're there, be aggressive and try to lead the best that I can."?
10. A season ago, as they made history, the 'Cats prided themselves on their blue-collar mentality, on their toughness and resolve and lock-down defense. But this season, on important occasions, they have surrendered a deluge of points, and even Saturday they gave up 73 to an Ivy League opponent. So finally, with his team on the cusp of reentering Big Ten play, Collins was asked the identity of this group. "At the end of the day," he said, "our identity, when we're at our best, is with a defensive mindset and (being) a team that is very unselfish and shares the ball. We have good players. But we have guys who are a function of our parts. We're not a one-man team. We're not a two-man team. We're at our best when our chemistry is great, and we're playing with great passion, and we're locked in defensively as a unit, and when we're running our offense and finding and sharing.
"I feel the spirit is good on the team. I feel we have veteran guys that are excited about going into the Big Ten. I still feel we're continually finding out what our strengths and weaknesses are. That's kind of a game-by-game thing. But I like the fact that we have guys that have been there. They've been through a lot in their careers. They've been through long losing streaks. They've been through winning streaks. Now, going into the Big Ten, for some of the guys it's their last go-round. I think you're going to see a real resolve."
NUsports.com Special Contributor
Ten things as the 'Cats prepare to resume Big Ten play Tuesday night at Allstate against Nebraska…
1. The moment arrived early in the second half of Northwestern's Saturday matinee with Brown, and it resembled many others that feature athletic young men pursuing a loose ball. But when this play ended one of them did not get up, and it was the point guard Bryant McIntosh. His left knee had been rolled by Bears' guard Zach Hunsaker, and he was damaged enough that he would need help getting up and making his way to the locker room. He would not reappear.
"We don't know much about him. I know you're going to ask," Chris Collins would say in his opening post-game statement. "It's a little bit of a knee issue. We're hoping for the best. But it would be stupid for me to try to say what it is. We just don't know. We've got to get with the medical staff to figure out the extent. Hopefully, you just pray for a guy like that who's a senior that it's not something that's going to cost him an extended amount of time."
2. The 'Cats were down three as McIntosh went to the locker room at 17:14 and here they were also without Vic Law, who was on the bench with four fouls. Seventy-four seconds later, as the media time out was called, their deficit was one and their aim was clear. "We talked about digging in, getting stops, being aggressive, not overreacting and panicking," remembered Collins, who spoke first and then gave way to his players.
"There were really strong voices," he said of them. "Scottie (Lindsey) had good things to say. Dererk (Pardon) had some good things to say. Vic. Our veteran guys really stepped up. I liked what I saw in our guys' eyes. They were determined, and they came out and backed it up."
"It was basically, 'Don't panic. If we play defense the game will come to us,'" Pardon would later add.
"We just wanted to get back to playing Northwestern basketball," concluded the junior guard Jordan Ash. "We felt like we weren't fighting like we should have been. We wanted to pick up our effort and energy."
3. Just 30 seconds after that time out, and despite their best intentions, the 'Cats were down seven after a three from the right wing by Brown guard Brandon Anderson. "A lot of teams could have folded at that moment," Collins would say, but his team would not. They would instead exhibit the resolve they had just discussed and with that came a dunk by Lindsey, a block by Pardon, which sprung a fast break that ended with an Ash three from the left corner.
"There's no question our defense picked up," Collins would say of this stretch, which irrevocably turned this game the 'Cats way.
4. The 'Cats holy trinity, of course, has long been Law, Lindsey and McIntosh. But here, in the belly of this game, they could only lean on one of them, and still they found a way to swing momentum and to take it over. They did that with Pardon, who would go six-of-seven from the field and six-of-eight from the line to finish with 18 points and eight boards, and they did that with Skelly, who hit his only two shots and ended with six points, four boards and three blocks. They got contributions too from center Barret Benson (six points) and forward Aaron Falzon (seven), and then there was the work of their other triumvirate, the guards Ash, Brown and Anthony Gaines.
"I'm seeing their confidence really grow," Collins would say when asked about the 33 points his bench contributed on this day. "I'm seeing growth in Ash. I'm seeing growth in Isiah Brown. I'm seeing growth in Gaines. I'm seeing growth in Barret Benson. Those guys are getting better, and certainly you need all your guys when you get into the Big Ten."
"Early in the season," Ash would soon say, "we were trying to find our roles a little bit and that kind of hurt us in some games. But I'd say the last five games, we've picked it up and tried to help the team anyway we can."
5. The 'Cats would be without their choreographer for nearly all of the second half, and foul trouble would limit the minutes of Law (17) and Lindsey (26), and still they would win 22. "You're down seven and Bryant goes down and there's real adversity," Collins later reflected. You kind of find out what's in your group. I thought we stayed poised and disciplined."
6. That was true enough. But even here, as has happened before in this season, Law and Lindsey did get themselves into that foul trouble. "They're so important with their length and their versatility, we need them to be smart and not pick up the cheap fouls to where we're managing fouls through the whole game," Collins said of this issue.
7. Then, of course, there was the McIntosh injury. "I don't even want to think about that right now," Collins would say when asked who would be his point if that injury sidelined his senior, but then he added this.
"It would be by committee," he added. "Nobody's going to be able to do what Bryant does, and a lot of what we do is built around him running the team and having the ball. You saw Jordan out there doing it. You saw Isiah out there doing it. That puts even more on Vic and Scottie, to become more floor generals and play makers as well. If we have to play without Bryant, it's something we're going to have to do by committee."
8. Ash, the junior, shot two-of-six on Saturday and finished with five points, four rebounds, two assists and two turnovers. Brown, the sophomore, shot two-of-five and finished with four points, four rebounds, three assists and one turnover. Gaines, the first year, shot five-of-11 and finished with 11 points, five rebounds, and two assists.
That is how the committee did against the Bears.
9. "They all have different skill sets," Collins would say when asked about this, his team's second triumvirate. "Ultimately, as a coach, you try to make the most out of the group you have. You try to bring out the best in what Jordan Ash can do with his energy and his defense. What I like about him is he's really getting confident offensively, which is helping him. He's shooting the ball better, he's making plays. You know with Isiah you've got an energy guy who can come in and score the ball. And then Gaines is just an emerging, outstanding player. As we move forward with our program, he's going to be a key guy as he continues to get experience and improve. He can do a little bit of everything out there."
"I think with Gaines, being a freshman, you have to try and bring energy," said Ash, offering his own scouting report. "But he's different. He had a college-ready body coming in, so he's able to drive to the basket. He's still learning. But he's definitely helping us on both ends. Isiah's a guy who can be a spark offensively off the bench. That's what he's been since he got here and he's getting better in that role. For me, first be a defensive player, then take my shots when they're there, be aggressive and try to lead the best that I can."?
10. A season ago, as they made history, the 'Cats prided themselves on their blue-collar mentality, on their toughness and resolve and lock-down defense. But this season, on important occasions, they have surrendered a deluge of points, and even Saturday they gave up 73 to an Ivy League opponent. So finally, with his team on the cusp of reentering Big Ten play, Collins was asked the identity of this group. "At the end of the day," he said, "our identity, when we're at our best, is with a defensive mindset and (being) a team that is very unselfish and shares the ball. We have good players. But we have guys who are a function of our parts. We're not a one-man team. We're not a two-man team. We're at our best when our chemistry is great, and we're playing with great passion, and we're locked in defensively as a unit, and when we're running our offense and finding and sharing.
"I feel the spirit is good on the team. I feel we have veteran guys that are excited about going into the Big Ten. I still feel we're continually finding out what our strengths and weaknesses are. That's kind of a game-by-game thing. But I like the fact that we have guys that have been there. They've been through a lot in their careers. They've been through long losing streaks. They've been through winning streaks. Now, going into the Big Ten, for some of the guys it's their last go-round. I think you're going to see a real resolve."
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