MORE: A look at Boise State

Northwestern opens its second-ever trip to the NCAA Tournament with a Thursday matchup against Boise State at 6:35 p.m. Central time in Sacramento, Calif. (TruTV).

Despite being the higher seed, the No. 7 Wildcats are one-point underdogs to the 10th-seeded Broncos.

Here are five questions we're thinking about as Northwestern prepares to take the floor.

This is what wins and losses for Northwestern usually comes down to. The Wildcats play terrific defense and take care of the basketball. So if they just shoot decently, they can beat just about anyone.

The Wildcats are an impressive 17-4 this season when they shoot 40% or better, including the highlight of the season, a 64-58 win over then-No. 1 Purdue on March 12.

However, Northwestern often struggles to hit that mark. For the season, they are right on the edge of that line, shooting 40.6%. How bad is that? The Wildcats rank 332nd out of 352 Division I teams.

The Wildcats are coming off of their second-worst shooting performance of the season when they shot just 31.8% in a loss to Penn State in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament.

Complicating matters for the NCAA Tournament games in Sacramento’s Golden 1 Center, NU's worst two shooting performances of the year came at neutral sites — against Auburn in Cancun, and Penn State at the United Center.

If Northwestern wants to make a run, shot-making is a must.

Chase Audige has already been named the Big Ten’s co-Defensive Player of the Year, and he is a finalist for the Naismith National Defensive Player of the Year award. But he has struggled on the offensive end of the court in recent weeks.

Since the calendar turned to March, Audige is just 6-of-34 from the floor, a brutal 17.6%. He's been even worse from beyond the arc, making just two of 15 three-pointers (13.3%).

After scoring in double figures for 20 of 22 games, and nine in a row from late January to late February, Audige has scored 10 or more points just once in Northwestern's last six games.

Audige still contributes in other ways, most obviously on defense. But the Wildcats could really use their No. 2 scorer to snap out of his funk.

Northwestern first-team All-Big Ten point guard Boo Buie has been doing the heavy lifting on offense for most of the season. He is the primary ballhandler, the leader in both scoring (17.1 per game) and assists (4.5 per game), and the guy who gets the rock in crunch time.

While Audige was Buie’s right-hand man for most of the year, his point production has fallen off considerably (see above). The Wildcats need someone to step up and alleviate some of the pressure felt by Buie.

Luckily, Brooks Barnhizer has emerged as Buie's wingman. The sophomore, thought of as a "glue guy" for much of the year, has scored in double figures in six straight games after reaching that mark just three times in the first 26 contests. Barnhizer has averaged 16.7 points in the Wildcats' last three games, more than double his season average.

If Barnhizer continues his scoring binge, and Audige and/or Ty Berry provide a decent third option, Northwestern can score enough to beat anyone.

Boise State has a notoriously small lineup, with no starter over 6-foot-7. But they have a legit post scorer in Tyson Degenhart.

The 6-7 sophomore forward leads the Broncos with 14.3 points per game and has an old-school, back-to-the-basket arsenal. He shot nearly 60% from the floor in Mountain West conference play.

Degenhart likes to back defenders down into the paint, similar to Penn State's Jalen Pickett. Northwestern traps players in the post relentlessly, but Degenhart can make that difficult by starting further out on the floor, making it harder for defenders to double him when he gets the ball, and then giving them a longer distance to cover when they scramble back out to the perimeter.

Robbie Beran will likely draw the assignment of guarding Degenhart, but he will get plenty of help.

Going hand-to-hand with the question above is what kind of lineup head coach Chris Collins will employ against the smaller Broncos.

Collins has used a small-ball lineup, with Beran at the center spot, several times this season, to great effect. Collins could try to match the Broncos' smaller lineup and take 7-footer Matt Nicholson off of the floor. A smaller, quicker Wildcat team can match-up with Boise State’s shooters outside and still double Degenhart in the post.

Or, Collins can go big and try to dominate in the paint by using combinations of Beran, Nicholson and Tydus Verhoeven on the floor. Those guys don't typically contribute much offensively, but they can crash the glass and give the Wildcats a big advantage inside on both ends of the floor.

The question is whether a big lineup will allow Boise State to go off from the perimeter. The Broncos finished second in the Mountain West in three-point shooting (36.5%) and have two players who shot over 40% from long distance: Max Rice (41.5%) and Chibuzo Agbo (40.8%).

Once the game tips off, the answers to these questions will be revealed. If the scales tip Northwestern's way, then a Saturday matchup against No. 2-seed UCLA may be in the cards.

But this is March, after all, and they call it madness for a reason.