I decided to take in the NIU at Akron game this late afternoon.

First, John Groce sports glasses which makes him look different. During the pre-game I only saw his back and wasn't sure if it was him. The NIU players were warming up and Groce was pumping them up like he was their coach--that was pretty neat to see him show respect for the opponent. Perhaps many he knew from scouting in Illinois or perhaps he does that with every visiting team?

Akron started out slow and sloppy with the freshman guard Cotton, getting the Zips some points with a few bombs. The Zips played a man defense and didn't have any weakness that I could tell and they rebounded strongly at the defensive end.

Then like a light going on with about 9 minutes in the first, the Zips just opened up a 16 point lead with hot shooting and forcing turnovers by NIU. NIU pulled it back to 8 down by half.

The second half the Zips had a little run to start the half and then NIU cut it back to 7 and then the Zips really went off. Duvivier a graduate student from Canada, built like a fullback, Cotton and Utomi bombed them from downtown and just like that the Zips had about a 23 point lead.

The Zips in the middle of the second threw a 1-3-1 defense on the Huskies which stretched out to almost a half court effort. Likely because the Huskies had little threat from the 3 ball but a few of their guys were slashing the Zips.

We will see how good Kirk is on defense. Cotton is a slightly built short guy with a quick release and was quite deadly from the behind the arc. If Kirk wants to be one of the top freshman guards in the MAC he should have incentive to shut Cotton down and pick his pocket a few times to lead a fast break or two.

I'd imagine that Ivy will be guarding Dardis and will not give him much room to take open threes unless Dardis can take him to the hoop to keep him honest.
I don't know which of the Bobcats will guard Duvivier, he can step back and hit the NBA three but didn't seem to be too effective at getting it into the paint.

Doug Taylor may be a go-to-guy as the Zips bigs are not their team's strength at least not on this particular Saturday.

Zips have a couple guys out with injuries too.

The Zips passing should lead to some Bobcat steals and it will take more than one Bobcat having a big game to beat Zippie. 80% of the Zips offense is taking the three. The Zips foul shooting looks improved vs Dambrot's teams. The Zips try to block shots and have some guys that look like they could on some pads and play on the gridiron as muscular as they are.