Wednesday, February 17, 2016 7:00 p.m.
Gentile Arena, Chicago, Ill.

When the two teams last faced each other on Jan. 16 in Cedar Falls, Loyola snagged their first ever win at UNI and their first conference win of the season, 51-41. The 2-4 Panthers went on to drop their next two conference games as well, sinking to 2-6 on the season through Jan. 23. But the Panthers have won six straight since—including a 53-50 win breaking Wichita State’s 43-game home winning streak and vaulting into 5th place.

UNI’s rotation is down to eight players, with only six seeing double digit minutes in close games. The starters are guards Wes Washpun (14.0 ppg), Matt Bohannon (12.5 ppg), Paul Jesperson (11.7 ppg), and Jeremy Morgan (10.3 ppg), plus forward Bennett Koch (8.3 ppg). Sophmore forward Klint Carlson gets the most minutes off the bench, and center Ted Friedman and guard Wyatt Lohaus add 6-10 minutes of rest for the starting crew. Sophomore guard Robert Knar from Mundelein, Ill. might get a minute or two if the Panthers get a comfy lead.

The Panthers have been winning by playing run and gun offense against weaker teams and employing grind-it-out defense against Wichita State and Evansville. And why not? It's tough to beat Evansville and Wichita State most nights in a shooting contest, so a smart option is to frustrate and slow their offense. And when you’re up against a team that has trouble shooting, make them try and match you. Either way, dictating the game you'd rather play is a big part of being a winning team. Loyola may present an entirely different problem-- a team that can out-slow and out-frustrate even the Panthers, who scored only 41 points against LU last time despite averaging 69.7 on the season.

Loyola needs a win over UNI to keep alive the very slim chances of a sixth place finish. A win over UNI, coupled with losses by Indiana State (at Illinois State) and Missouri State (at Wichita on Thursday) would put the Ramblers two games behind UNI and one game behind the Sycamores and Bears—with three games to play. Loyola also has a game at Missouri State that is a must win to earn a chance at a tiebreaker. By the way, the tiebreaker formula is a little bit different this year:



The non-con strength of schedule is out—replaced by the overall RPI. As of now, Loyola would best only Bradley and Drake in a tiebreaker, but to get to a tie with Missouri State or Indiana State, those teams would have to lose a few games and the Ramblers would have to beat UNI, and win on the road at Missouri State and Drake. It doubtful that Indiana State drops below Loyola in RPI, unless they lose at Bradley and the Ramblers beat Wichita State.

Loyola game notes: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/loy ... 216aaa.pdf

Northern Iowa game notes: http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/loy ... a_niwa.pdf

TV/Streaming video: Comcast SportsNet Plus

Vegas odds: Panthers by 5

I can't believe anyone could watch this game being played at this pace and rationally think we have a chance to win. They are better shooters and better rebounders, and if we're playing sloppy and fast, forget it.

Wait, Adgei is playing? That just begs the renewed questions of why he hasn't been playing the last two+ months??

Last played Dec.13 @ Note Dame.

Tied at half--Not so bad -- The boys are doing just fine, and I do not care if PM is playing Santa Claus at forward just so we win.

UNI is very tired. But how many times are we going to dribble into double teams in the paint?

Seems like we've been doing that all year

Holy crap. This game.

Maybe this year has been making up for all the good luck we had last year...regressing to the mean

_________________
Cigarboy sucks!

That almost ended very, very bad. But, it didn't. Big win against a team that came in hot.

I lived six lifetimes in the 170 years that three-pointer took to clank off the rim. Nice to end up on the good side of a close one.