EVANSTON, Ill. - After falling behind six points at the break and going 9:35 without a field goal to close the first frame, Northwestern posted a 54-point second half to storm back and beat Indiana, 79-70, on Wednesday night at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
The Wildcats main power source was the resurgent Ty Berry, who sank a career-high seven three-pointers and posted 23 points.
"He's a big part of these last two or three years with the winning, the culture, the leadership," Collins said. "It was just awesome to see him have that kind of night."
Brooks Barnhizer was right behind Berry with 21 points, plus eight rebounds, six assists and a career high of his own with six steals.
Mackenzie Mgbako led the Hoosiers with 20 points.
It was Northwestern's fifth straight win in the series against the Hoosiers, the most for the program against their Big Ten rival in more than 100 years.
Here are our takeaways from Northwestern's crucial home win over Indiana that lifted their record to 12-7 (3-5 Big Ten).
Northwestern's Fantastic Four came to play in the second half: Northwestern's core four of Berry, Barnhizer, Nick Martinelli and Jalen Leach scored all 54 of the Wildcats' second-half points and 77 of 79 overall. Leach scored all 15 of his points after the break, while Martinelli chipped in 11 of his 18.
The consistent lack of scoring diversity has been an Achilles heel of Northwestern's this season, but it didn't matter against the Hoosiers. The second half looked like the beaches of Troy, as Berry and Leach rained down 3 after 3, shooting a combined 10-for-17 beyond the arc in the game and 7-for-10 in the second.
"A lot of green beans all around," Berry said, citing the 2K animation for perfect timing. "It's contagious. Once you see one or two go in, the hoop turns into an ocean."
Their eagle-eyed performance combined for 27 points. The other 27 came from the traditional scorers, Barnhizer and Martinelli, who utilized the swathes of spacing created by the shots from beyond the arc to punish the Hoosiers in the paint.
The Wildcats desperately needed all four of them after Indiana closed the first half on an 18-2 run.
"I told the guys that it's not panic time, but it's extreme sense of urgency time," Collins said. "Coming home off the tough loss to Michigan, you have to win these games if you want to stay relevant."
Northwestern's veterans answered the call. They applied game pressure on the Hoosiers from the moment the second half started with a 16-6 run in the first four minutes to retake the lead. They controlled the ball with just four second-half turnovers and turned up the heat on defense, forcing nine from Indiana.
The quartet represents nearly two decades of college basketball, and all but Martinelli are putting together the final stretches of their careers. They know what's at stake and, in the second half, they played like it.
Berry is back via the bench: After five points total in his first three conference games of 2025, Berry was moved to the bench to move Angelo Ciaravino into the starting lineup.
He's risen as a Phoenix-like sixth man from that decision with 50 points over the past three games, with key contributions to foundational wins over Maryland and Indiana at Welsh-Ryan Arena.
"I've always loved Ty," Collins said. "I'm an enthusiastic, high-energy person... Coaches need to get some of that in return. He fills my bucket a lot with that. When he's not right, it affects me [too]. I feed off his energy, enthusiasm...that smile when he's playing with joy."
Berry's move to the bench has been mostly symbolic. In fact, it's been downright paradoxical.
"I feel like coming off the bench, you see a lot more," Berry said. "You see how the game is being played. You see what's open, what's there and as an older guy, that's what I'm looking for those first four minutes of the game to see what's available and how I can get my shots."
Collins said he treated Berry like a starter in the second half against IU, playing him all 20 minutes so that he was on the court when it counted most.
His play has certainly earned a return to the starting lineup, but why mess with a good thing?
The future is now: Northwestern has beaten Indiana five times in a row for the first time since 1913-15. There's no doubt the Hoosiers have fallen on hard times.
Isiah Thomas, Steve Alford, Bobby Knight, you name them: they're not walking through that door. But you still saw a century-long paradigm shift.
"We're trying to earn our respect in this league," Collins said. "We're in the best league in the country and we play teams like Indiana with five...national titles, Big Ten championships, historical players and coaches... We're trying to build something here [of our own] and it's a fun process... It's hard for some people in striped shirts to understand but we have a good team."
Collins has bordered on pontificating at points in press conferences as he works to build the image of himself and his program to the elite standing he thinks they deserve. But after a 54-point rally, the proof of his words was on the court.
"We're going to win, because that's what we do," Collins said. "These past couple years, I've started to see that attitude. Boo was a big driver of that. Ty and Brooks, and now Nick and Matt Nicholson, it was Chase Audige and Robbie Beran... [They were] thinking you know what? We're Northwestern, so we're going to win."
The Wildcats have another one of the conference's premier programs up next, at No. 17 and in-state rival Illinois. The Illini are guaranteed to be rankled by their loss at Welsh-Ryan Arena in December and boast an eight-game home winning streak over the Wildcats that's starting to feel a century long in its own right.
The Wildcats needed to beat the Hoosiers to keep their season and tournament hopes alive and get out of "extreme sense of urgency time". Now, they turn towards a trip to play the Illini to see if they can take their resume from a position of survival to a position of strength.
