Men’s basketball

Five games into Northwestern’s conference schedule it’s difficult to tell what kind of team the Wildcats are, but that’s not a bad thing.

Last year NU’s identity was obvious. In his first year as coach, Chris Collins turned an inherited roster into the best defensive unit he could. The Cats didn’t score many points, but they suffocated the opposition by grinding the pace of the game to a halt and playing frenzied defense.

It’s a strategy that led to memorable upset wins over Illinois at home and Wisconsin on the road, but also one that created disappointments like a 59-32 dud in NU’s senior night against Penn State.

The Cats finished last season 14-19, and standing at 10-8 this year they’re on pace to meet what was expected of them in the preseason. But NU’s journey from 2014-2015 has been anything but predictable.

Collins understandably changed tact this season with his first recruiting class under his belt. Having players he personally brought in enabled Collins to design his own system around them, and more importantly an injection of offensive talent allowed a departure from Collins’ defense-oriented scheme.

At least, that was the theory. The end result has been far murkier this season.

NU opened conference play with a low-scoring 51-47 victory over Rutgers, a game that fits in perfectly with last years’ results. But that was immediately erased by a blowout loss to Wisconsin in which the Cats looked lost on both ends of the court.

Those games were followed by a pair of surprisingly competent offensive performances in close losses against Michigan State and Illinois. Most recently, NU dropped a 56-54 heartbreaker to Michigan despite junior center Alex Olah scoring a game-high 22 points.

The only constant through all this fluctuation has been freshman point guard Bryant McIntosh, the Cats’ rising star who can’t seem to rise fast enough. He’s tied for the team lead in scoring with 11.9 points per game, and despite having just 4 points against the Wolverines he had the ball in his hands for the game-tying shot.

Everything around McIntosh has been in flux while Collins searches for that elusive winning strategy. Olah in particular has drawn criticism for his up-and-down play, with his offensive outburst moderated by low-scoring flat-lines against the Badgers and Spartans.

Junior guard Tre Demps continues to be Tre Demps, caught in a strange purgatory where a player shooting 38 percent from the floor and 29 percent from beyond the arc can still be considered a team’s best offensive threat.

Supporting characters: freshman forward Vic Law, sophomore forward Sanjay Lumpkin and senior guard JerShon Cobb have each had their moments in the spotlight, but all have failed to emerge as consistent threats.

This is McIntosh’s team, and unlike most parents, Collins seems totally confident with a teenager behind the wheel. By forgoing any specific ideology and handing the reigns to his best player, Collins has more latitude to experiment with the rest of his roster.

The lack of an identity combined with a freshman point guard means plenty of growing pains for NU, but that’s not something to lament for a rebuilding team.

Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @BobbyPillote