Northwestern basketball year in review

2021 was mostly a year to forget for Northwestern basketball. The most memorable thing was a losing streak that lasted almost two full months and represented the program’s longest in 30 years.

The calendar year, which covered the majority of the Wildcats’ 2020-21 season and the beginning of 2021-22, started with a brutal 12-game losing streak. Adding a loss in the last game of 2020, and Northwestern’s record-setting slide reached 13 games, the longest losing streak of head coach Chris Collins’ tenure and the program’s longest since the 1990-91 Cats dropped 19 straight under coach Bill Foster on their way to finishing winless in the Big Ten.

The start of Northwestern’s string of sorrow began with an 87-72 loss at No. 10 Iowa on Dec. 29 of 2020. The Wildcats wouldn’t win again until a 67-59 road win at Minnesota on Feb. 25, a span of 58 days. That’s a long time between celebratory water bottle showers in the locker room.

Interestingly, the Wildcats won three in a row before the start of the streak to begin the Big Ten schedule, and then won three in a row after the streak to end the Big Ten schedule. But in between were a whole lot of losses. Five of them were by single digits, two of them were by more than 20 and one came in double overtime.

For the year, Northwestern went 3-13 to close out the 2020-21 season, including a loss in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament. Right now, the Cats sit at 8-2 to begin the 2021-22 season. They will likely be 9-2 after a Thursday matchup with 0-11 Prairie View A&M on Dec. 30.

Assuming a victory in that one against the overmatched Panthers, the Wildcats will finish with a 2021 record of 12-15. That doesn’t sound too bad until you figure in that just five of the wins – three last season and two so far this season – came against Power Six opponents.

Still, we will look back at the 2021 year by looking at the high point, the low point and the player of the year.

Northwestern’s best wins during 2021 both came against Maryland. On March 3, the Cats beat a Terrapins team that won a game in the NCAA tournament, 60-55. Then, on Dec. 5, they opened Big Ten play with a 67-61 win at Maryland.

But we’re going to go off the hardwood for our apex: on Aug. 30, Northwestern pulled off a stunning recruiting win to land four-star, Rivals100 point guard Rowan Brumbaugh.

It’s difficult to overstate how impressive a coup this was for the Wildcats, but perhaps it can be best summed up by this: Brumbaugh turned down an offer from Kansas to play at Northwestern. How often do you suppose that has happened? The feisty 6-foot-4 point guard had 33 offers to his credit; his other finalists were Oregon, Texas, Maryland and Miami.

Brumbaugh is ranked as the No. 93 player in the country. He is the third highest-rated player that Collins has brought to Evanston, behind only Miller Kopp (No. 66) and Pete Nance (67), who were both part of the 2018 class. (Kopp transferred to Indiana this year as a graduate.)

So how did the Wildcats pull it off? By getting in early and establishing a strong relationship with the confident, bordering on cocky point man. Northwestern offered Brumbaugh in May, when he was an unranked, three-star point guard. After a strong May evaluation period, Brumbaugh started collecting a host of Power Five offers and took official visits to Northwestern, Maryland, Georgetown and Wisconsin.

Brumbaugh exploded after dropping a 42-point triple-double in the AAU summer session, rocketing up the player rankings and picking up offers from Kansas and Texas and fielding calls from blue bloods like Duke, Kentucky and North Carolina. But Brumbaugh stuck with Collins, a coach with whom he felt a special kinship.

He also revels in defying conventional wisdom. He’d rather beat a blue blood as an underdog than join one himself.

"I've always been the type of kid who has thought for myself, who always went against the typical or 'right' way, and maybe not picked the coolest or the sexiest place," he told WildcatReport. "I'm going to bet on myself. I have a real opportunity to change and lead a program, and do things that the program has never done before."

That’s music to a Northwestern fan’s ears.

MORE: Meet Rowan Brumbaugh, the kid who turned down Kansas for Northwestern

The losses during Northwestern’s brutal two-month losing streak all kind of blended together, but one stood out above all others: a 79-76 loss to Indiana in double-overtime. Chances are you remember it. You probably felt it physically if you watched it.

While the Wildcats lost games just about every way imaginable during their string of defeats, there’s little debate that this was the most painful one. Northwestern has been known to blow tight games down the stretch under Collins, but this one was unique because the Wildcats seemed to have it hand twice. They blew two late leads – one in regulation and one in the first overtime.

First, they led by a seemingly comfortable seven points with two minutes to play in regulation before things unraveled. The Wildcats turned the ball over three times and committed three fouls as the Hoosiers scored the last seven points to tie it at 54 at the end of regulation.

The Wildcats came back to forge a 66-60 lead with one minute to play in the first overtime before fouls proved their undoing. The Cats committed fouls on two straight Indiana possessions, and the Hoosiers hit all four of their free throws. Then, the final two times they had the ball, they missed a the front end of a one-on-one and incurred a shot-clock violation. IU’s Aljami Durham hit a jumper to tie the game at 66 with one second left to tie it.

Finally, in the second OT, Indiana put the Wildcats out of their misery. The Hoosiers scored eight of their 13 points from the free-throw line as Northwestern was forced to swallow a three-point loss.

Free throws wound up deciding the outcome as Indiana made 27 of 38, while NU tallied just 8 of 12. Ryan Greer and Kopp both fouled out for the Wildcats.

MORE: Cats squander two late leads in heartbreaking loss to IU

We could have gone with Chase Audige for this award after the transfer led the Wildcats in scoring in 2020-21. But the dynamic guard missed the first seven games of the 2021-22 season, while our pick carried the team on his back in his absence.

Pete Nance has simply been the player Northwestern fans hoped he would be to start this season. He leads the team in scoring (16.3 ppg), rebounding (8.0) and blocks (2.0). The 6-foot-10 senior also ranks in the Top 10 in the Big Ten in scoring, rebounding, blocks and field-goal percentage.

Not that he was a slouch last season, either. He finished third on the team in scoring (11.1 ppg), and led the way in rebounds (6.8) and blocks (.71).

Nance, a skilled big with the talent to shoot 3s, post-up on the block or put the ball on the floor and drive to the basket, has been a matchup nightmare for opponents. He’s been consistent, too, scoring in double figures in all 10 games thus far and racking up at least five rebounds in each. He’s gone for a double-double three times and has averaged 16.5 points and 7.8 rebounds per game against the four Power Six opponents the Cats have faced so far.

The Wildcats are at their best when they work their offense through Nance. If Northwestern is going to compete to get into the top half of the Big Ten this season and put themselves in the conversation for making the Big Dance for the second time in school history (they are currently among the last four teams in for ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi), Nance is going to be the one who gets them there.