If its first two games were any indication, Northwestern could present an even more menacing offensive juggernaut than it did last season.
NU’s 97-78 win against Northern Illinois last Friday was the highest-scoring performance the Wildcats have put together during coach Bill Carmody’s 11 years at the helm. More importantly, it proved junior forward John Shurna – who put up a career-high-tying 31 points on the evening – and sophomore guard Drew Crawford are in prime shooting form and senior point guard Michael Thompson is still the commander of Carmody’s back-cut-heavy Princeton offense.
What was less definitive and, in all likelihood, even more defining, is how the Cats will fare defensively after finishing a dismal 169th nationally in efficiency last season – considerably behind its impressive 33rd offensive efficiency ranking.
“We need to work on containing better,” Thompson said. “We have known all along that defense is something we are going to need to improve on to be successful.”
It’s the Achilles’ heel of NU’s deepest squad in years, and one that Carmody addressed during the team’s trip to Italy this summer when NU faced off against four professional squads. The Cats, whose signature defense is a 1-3-1 zone that forces pressure at the top of key, almost exclusively played a man-to-man defense while abroad and still managed to win all of their matches.
“It was a valuable experience for us,” Thompson said. “We didn’t really work on it much before Italy, but every team in Italy had different offense so we had to adjust on the fly.”
It’s the sort of transition NU will need to make effortlessly against more lethal Big Ten opponents later in this season, though it’s one that has given the Cats fits in their opening matches.
NU started with a man-to-man formation in its season opener at Northern Illinois, but the Huskies broke through the zone to go 5-for-6 in field goal attempts and jump out to an early 13-5 lead.
When the Cats switched to a 1-3-1 zone soon thereafter, the momentum swung decisively back in their favor.
“Our defense kind of led to offense, and we picked it up,” Crawford said. “We were able to put a lot more pressure on their guards.”
That pressure helped NU to generate nine forced turnovers in the first half as Crawford went on a 12-point tear to lead a 19-3 run.
The Cats never lost the lead once they made the switch.
“We went to the zone, and we turned them over a few times and we scored off those turnovers,” Carmody said after the game. “(We) got a couple easy ones. Drew hit a couple in transition, or semi-transition, and I thought that changed the tempo of things.”
But Carmody refused to relinquish the man-to-man defense on Wednesday night when NU traveled to Texas-Pan American. This time, the Cats didn’t make the switch until late in the second half with the Broncs coming dangerously close to staging the sort of upset that NU can’t afford on its less-than-elite non-conference slate.
The defensive transition spurred an 11-point lead for NU – its most comfortable margin of the night.
NU (2-0) will continue to test its defensive savvy when it returns to Welsh-Ryan Arena for its season home opener against Arkansas-Pine Bluff (0-2) on Friday night.
What the matchup lacks in prestige, it makes up for in poeticism – the Golden Lions made it to the NCAA Tournament for the first time last season, winning their first game against Winthrop before falling to perennial powerhouse and eventual tournament champions, Duke.
It’s the sort of history NU is hoping to make this season.
“It’s really exciting to get to come back home to play,” Thompson said. “We’ve got some momentum coming off those home wins, and we’re just looking to keep that going all season.”
