With the start of college basketball season in early November, we’ll examine the conference as a whole and Indiana’s roster over the coming weeks.
Today, our team previews continue with Northwestern.
Previously: Penn State, Washington, Minnesota, USC
The Boo Buie era in Evanston is over. After leading the Wildcats to back-to-back NCAA tournament appearances in 2023 and 2024, Buie will soon be in training camp with the Phoenix Suns, attempting to play his way onto an NBA roster.
After winning a March Madness game in each of the last two seasons, Chris Collins hopes the pieces are assembled to guide Northwestern back to the tournament for a third straight season.
Despite the losses of Buie and Ryan Langborg, the Wildcats return plenty of production from a team that won 22 games and earned a double bye in the Big Ten tournament. Three starters return to Evanston, including a strong All-Big Ten candidate in Brooks Barnhizer.
The 6-foot-6 Barnhizer, a Lafayette native, is one of the top returning players in the league. As a junior, he averaged 14.6 points, 7.5 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 1.8 steals. Over Northwestern’s final 13 games last season, Barnhizer grabbed ten or more rebounds on eight occasions. He was also named to the league’s All-Defensive team and shot close to 42 percent on 3s in conference games.
Ty Berry returns for a fifth season after missing the final 11 games last season due to a knee injury. The 6-foot-3 guard shot 43.3 percent on 3s overall last season and 46.3 percent in conference games. As an excellent free throw shooter, Berry will have more opportunities to score and create for others with Buie’s graduation.
Nick Martinelli, a 6-foot-7 junior, saw his minutes go up last season after Berry’s injury. The Glenview, Illinois native poured in a career-high 27 points in a late February win at Maryland and scored in double figures nine times over the team’s final 15 games. Martinelli rarely turns the ball over and shot a stellar 54.4 percent on 2s last season.
Matthew Nicholson was a starter in the frontcourt for most of the season but was the victim of an injury late in the season that forced him to miss the final five games. The 7-footer isn’t much of a scoring threat but is efficient with the opportunities he does get. Nicholson shot 65.7 percent on 2s last season and 66.7 percent on 2s in Big Ten games, which led the league. Nicholson, like Berry, is using a fifth year of eligibility granted…