Northwestern stands at 10-3 at the end of 2024. What can Collins and Co. learn heading into the new year?
We’re switching it up a bit this week. There is only one game from the last week to break down, an 85-60 win over Northeastern that started scarily but turned into a beatdown. So instead, we’ll use this space to take the 3,000-foot view of the non-conference portion of the season (plus Illinois and Iowa) and find some lessons from this team heading into Big Ten play. There won’t be film this week, but there will be plenty of analysis.
Let’s look at five tidbits and takeaways from the early part of Northwestern’s season.
1. Brooks. Barnhizer.
Much was made, and deservedly so, of Nick Martinelli’s ridiculous start. But since returning from a lingering foot injury, Barnhizer has been the team’s best player and has a real argument for the conference’s top spot as well.
Barnhizer ranks third in the Big Ten in scoring, second in rebounding, 11th in assists, first in steals and 16th in blocks. Not only is Barnhizer the only player in the top 20 in all five categories (ignoring the fact that he’s top three in three stats), there isn’t a player who ranks within the top 20 in FOUR of the five categories.
Barnhizer is averaging 20.1 points, 9.4 rebounds, 4 assists, 2.7 steals and 1.1 blocks per game. Only Ron Harper Sr. has ever met or exceeded those numbers over the course of a season, doing it for the 1979-80 Miami (OH) RedHawks. His son, Dylan, is one of Barnhizer’s two main competitors for Big Ten Player of the Year at the moment. If you round each of those numbers down to the nearest 0.5, the list gets one name bigger: Larry Bird’s sophomore season, one of the greatest single seasons in college basketball history.
What Barnhizer is doing is singularly great. He is a lock to make All-Big Ten First Team if he stays near his current paces and likely the favorite to win Big Ten POTY. He also could very easily win the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year award. Barnhizer also has a real case to be an All-American and receive votes for the Naismith Award if Northwestern performs well in Big Ten play and Barnhizer continues to be the catalyst and stuff the stat sheet.
2. Backwards Evolution
Never has the sport of basketball been so dependent on the three pointer. Some people love the trey. Others blame the apparent plummeting of NBA television ratings on the amount of three pointers taken. Children are yelling “Curry!” when they used to yell “Kobe!”.
Not Chris Collins. Northwestern has never attempted as few threes during the Collins era and, dating back to 2008 (the first year of information on Bart Torvik), their current mark of 30.4 is the lowest by a significant margin, with the 2019-20 squad’s 33.8% rate placing a distant second.
Inside NU’s Adam Beck looked into this last week and found that Northwestern’s offense is essentially optimized. Basically, they’re taking the right amount of threes. The team is shooting just 33.5% from three and while some players (Barnhizer, Ty Berry) are likely due for positive regression, others (Martinelli) will surely regress negatively. So while Northwestern’s offense may not be great, ‘Cats fans can take heart in the fact that their coaching staff has constructed an optimal game plan so far this year.
3. Defense wins championships
The Wildcats sit at 16th in Bart Torvik’s adjusted defensive efficiency metric heading into the new year, good for fourth in the Big Ten. The ‘Cats have done it a number of ways but what stands out on paper is their overwhelming size.
A year ago, Northwestern started three players at 6’3’’ or shorter in Berry, Boo Buie and Ryan Langborg. Add in Jordan Clayton who was in the rotation for the better part of the season, and you’ve got one of the smallest teams in the conference. This season, Berry is the shortest player consistently in the rotation and there isn’t a single player on the roster (besides the redshirting Clayton) listed under 6’3’’. That gives Collins and staff a huge lineup, allowing the ‘Cats to effectively execute their coach’s preferred style of defense: switch one through four and hard hedge with Nicholson and Hunger. As a result, Northwestern has a tremendous baseline heading into conference play because its defense should keep them in any game.
4. Stop overlooking the rebounding
While it doesn’t often get mentioned, one of the main contributors to the ‘Cats success this season has been a huge leap on the glass. In 2023-24, Northwestern had an offensive rebounding rate of 25.8% and allowed 27.8% of opponents’ shots to elude their grasp. This year, the latter number has decreased to 25.6% while their own rebounding rate has skyrocketed to 30.3%. Defensively, the metrics are similar. While the percentage is a little better, both this year’s squad and last year’s rank fourth in the Big Ten in defensive rebounding rate. However, the 2023-24 Wildcats were the worst offensive rebounding team in the Big Ten, while this year’s team sits firmly in the middle of the pack. The extra shots have been a huge boon to a team that doesn’t tend to score in bunches.
5. Exploiting the three…defensively?
Here’s an interesting stat. Last year’s Wildcats allowed opponents to shoot 34.5% against them from beyond the arc (although at times in the non-conference it felt like 50%). Their opponents shot 37.3% of their attempts from deep. This year, however, opponents are shooting a measly 32.5% on threes. However, their attempts have actually gone UP a considerable amount, jumping to over 40% of total shot attempts.
The question is, how likely are these numbers to stay? Can Northwestern continue to defend the three as well as they do (and get lucky)? And if so, will the intelligent coaches in the Big Ten still take as many shots from deep against Collins’ bunch? It’s hard to tell. If the numbers stay the same, it could be a recipe for success for the ‘Cats. In their marquee victory over Illinois, the Illini continually missed threes down the stretch but kept firing over and over again. If the defense consistently forces a high volume of looks but continues to force them to be difficult, Northwestern have a good chance of staying dominant defensively.
Bonus: Chris Collins Sideline Antics
I sincerely hope Collins has not made a New Year’s Resolution to be calmer on the sidelines. Watching him pace up and down the bench and lay into unsuspecting players or referees is a joy of mine and probably draws too much of my attention during the game. He’s had a few outbursts so far this year, but the best was his defense of Barnhizer late in the DePaul game, which I broke down in last week’s edition of Collins’ Classroom. While his zeal can get him in trouble (see Purdue on the road last year), he generally has enough control to know how far he can go and when is an appropriate time to afford a tech (see Purdue on the road last year also).
Here’s to another year of Collins crowd pump-ups, explosions and celebrations.