clarkwgriswold

Here's a little trivia to bring some perspective- How many D1 basketball teams are undefeated in conference? One. Yale. 11-0. That's also fewer games than other conferences have played.

Muncie, Indiana's Worthen Arena awaits the Zips Tuesday night as the Zips face off against the Ball State Cardinals. The Cardinals come into the game at 14-13/7-7. The teams met at the JAR on February 4th, a game where the Zips led by 2 at half then pulled away to an 81-73 win. The Cards are 4-1 since that loss, the only loss being by one point at Toledo. Two of those wins came in OT. Payton Sparks appears to be finally recovering from a year and a half of sitting on the bench and not exactly dedicating himself to his cardiovascular health. Jermahri Hill continues to lead scoring at 15.7 ppg. Sparks is second in scoring at 13.3 ppg and leads rebounding at 7.8 rpg.

Step away from the bridges people. These things happen every season. The other MAC teams have figured out how to attack the Zips reliance on the 3 point shot. It was all a matter of time. This team has the coaching and talent to adapt to how they are now being defensed and will respond. Groce, Ford and a staff will figure this out and the players have the experience, maturity and leadership to carry it out. They've lost one game in 2025. It's not time to shake up the lineup or the rotations. Pay attention to who is in the game at crunch time, not who plays the first 5 minutes. That will show you who Groce trusts.

Into each season a little misery must fall.

My feed's not working. Thank goodness.

Awful half. Unfortunately, this is not NIU at the JAR. The second half will be a real character tester for the Zips.

Another team running the Zips off of the 3 point line. OU is not playing well but the Zips thus far are.... I had a bad feeling about this one this week.

Sloppy...sloppy...sloppy...

I have Zips/Bobcats on one screen and Beterbiev/Bivol II on another.

Now they are saying 6:04 on the ESPN app.

Last year's thread.

They are prohibited from using it under the ADA due to the PTSD you suffer from the cannon in years past.

Good point. Bud's checkbook is certainly an advantage, but that view (often voiced by residents of Brimfield and environs) fails to recognize their own failures in building their own programs. It also doesn't recognize the other factors where the Zips have an advantage- better coaching...tradition of winning and championships...nice facilities (other than the JAR)...

Weird year for the MAC, across the board. There's no single player who is dominating the conference. Heck, the leading scorer (Jones from NIU) is averaging only 17 a game. Nate is 16th in the MAC in scoring, 24th in rebounding, 7th in assists and 3rd in steals. Solid and multi-dimensional but nothing that jumps out. If the voters look at who's the best player on the best team he probably has a chance.

He kind of lost the ability to deny his involvement when he put the package in the stove. 🤦‍♂️

I'm looking forward to Mahaffey next year as I've heard he was very good up until he hurt his knee.

Historically, basketball has been reluctant to retire numbers as the tradition is to not have a number over 55, as those make it more difficult for an official to signal to the scorer's table with two hands. With only 55 numbers, you could eliminate a decent portion of the numbers over time as you retired them. As a result, the jersey goes in the rafters rather than getting retired.

No Matthew Wilson bobblehead prizes?

Is there a jugs gun for basketballs? If there was I'd like to see him catch 500 passes a day! His hands are a little iffy at times.

Just like the good old days where you saw consistent player development over 4 years.

Amen. Just plain clueless.

You could really see the growth of his game and Groce's corresponding confidence in him as the season would down last year and through the tournament as he was consistently in during the crucial points at the end of games.

The Zips take the nation's longest win streak into Athens Saturday night to face the 14-12/8-5 Bobcats. The Bobcats are coming off of a two point win over CMU. 6'8" senior forward AJ Clayton continues to lead Bobcat scoring at 14.3 ppg while being second in rebounding at 5.4 rpg. Sophomore guard AJ Brown and junior guard Jackson Paveletzke each score 13.2 ppg, with Paveletzke leading in assists at 5 apg.

Another player deserving some praise tonight is Amani. The Zips switched a lot on screens tonight putting him on smaller faster guards and he did a great job.

I think there's enough tape out there now too to enable the competition to craft a game plan. They also now aren't sneaking up on anybody and they're getting every team's best efforts. I'll give the NIU coach credit for getting his kids to play hard despite their tough stretch.