Northwestern men’s basketball is many things, but the ‘Cats under Chris Collins have rarely been accused of being fun to watch.
Games one through three offered a glimmer of hope that this year’s group could
be a little easier on the eyes. Northwestern sauntered through its low-major tuneups by an average of 31 points. From the Daily Northwestern’s Charlie Spungin, it was the first time in program history that the ‘Cats had won each of their first three contests by 20 or more. The 110-point explosion against Cleveland State was Northwestern’s highest scoring total since 2020. Max Green’s second half heat check was a threat to national security.
The days of slow paced, defense first, ugly, backyard brawl basketball were no more.
With speed demon Jayden Reid at the point, the Northwestern offense flashed a “run you out of the gym” capability not seen since probably the first half of a 2024 win over Nebraska. Boo Buie and Ty Berry couldn’t be cooled down with a fire house in that one. That was fun. It was all fun. Bart Torvik had Northwestern listed as a top-20 team in the country through three games. Hang the dang banner.
This weekend’s Greenbrier Tip-Off — and last weekend’s 81-79 win against DePaul — was Ed Helms waking up with a tooth missing and a tiger in his bathtub.
The numbers on the glass are staggering. Per CBBanalytics.com, South Carolina and Virginia averaged an offensive rebound rate of 45.9% against Northwestern on the weekend. That’s second chance opportunities on almost half of all missed shots. Prairie View A&M, the worst defensive rebounding team in the country last season, finished the year conceding a rebound rate of 39.1%. In Big Ten conference play last season, 33.1% was all it took for last place.
Against Torvik’s top 100 opponents — of Northwestern’s first six matchups, DePaul, South Carolina and Virginia fall into this category — Rutgers is the only Big Ten opponent worse on the defensive glass than the ‘Cats.
Anyone who watched the games this weekend doesn’t need any numbers to know how poor Northwestern was on the glass. Leading by one with less than 90 seconds to play, Virginia grabbed three offensive rebounds on one possession in one of the more hair-pulling sequences of Wildcat basketball in recent memory.
The defensive statistics are similarly worrying.
If last year’s team was defense first, the 2025-26 Wildcats are defense last. The absences of Brooks Barnhizer, Berry and Matt Nicholson were felt in full force in West Virginia. Northwestern’s defensive rating of 122.8 in the Greenbrier puts the ‘Cats in the bottom 12th percentile nationally.
Arrinten Page is not blameless for Northwestern’s shortcomings on defense and on the glass, despite making big plays on defense down the stretch in both games. With Page, I keep coming back to a note in his high school scouting report from 247Sports.
“When everything is clicking, and he’s fully engaged in the game, his tools and impact can jump right out at you,” scout Adam Finklestein begins his evaluation. “There are, however, other moments when he is less active and involved in with the game.”
It’s not an effort thing — based on eye test alone, I’d bet Page leads Northwestern in loose-balls-dived-for. But there are moments where Page finds himself ill-positioned on defense and doesn’t make a play in a situation where a guy like Nicholson would.
That’s enough negativity for a 1-1 showing in a November round-robin against two Power Five opponents in a hotel ballroom.
Tyler Parker, my favorite of the All-Star team covering the NBA at The Ringer, recently christened Philadelphia 76ers guard Tyrese Maxey as a “player who brings on the credits, a player you can end the movie with.” Nick Martinelli just about has his star on Hollywood Boulevard already, even if the Virginia debacle was more Anger Management than Shining. Page may be there too.
Chris Collins’ project from Cincinnati hit the biggest shot of his itinerant college basketball career on Sunday night. With Reid swallowed by the ghosts of Greenbrier and Northwestern a poorly-placed cigarette stub away from a five-alarm fire, the former top-40 recruit took matters into his own hands. The final shot was drawn up for Martinelli — it would have been silly to try anything else. But with No. 2 stood up at the baseline, Page found Northwestern’s deliverance in his lap with three seconds remaining. Roll those credits.
The defense and rebounding were shocking for a Collins basketball team, but the two-headed monster of Page and Martinelli is enough reason for optimism. Martinelli bounced back from his nine point dud against Virginia with 25 against South Carolina. While Reid’s 25 points against Virginia came with inefficient 6-for-15 shooting splits and a series of wild misses in transition down the stretch, the New York native still raises the ceiling of the Wildcat offense exponentially.
A few more rapid fire takeaways (borrowing/stealing the format from Inside NU’s Eliav Brooks-Rubin, whose postgame threads on X are required reading):
- Green may not be a plus defender, but neither is anyone else outside maybe Angelo Ciaravino and Justin Mullins. His offense is too valuable for him not to be a bigger part of the rotation.
- Reid is maybe the fastest player I’ve ever seen on a basketball court.
- Jake West looked comfortable as the first guy off the bench in both contests. Ripping straight from one Eliav’s tweets after the Virginia game, it looks like West has all but taken Jordan Clayton’s spot in the rotation. I’m not 100% sure if this is a good thing given the struggles on defense. While Clayton isn’t the threat that West is on offense, he is still a steady ball handler and far-and-away the better perimeter defender.
The Oklahoma State game on Thursday is a big one. The Cowboys offense is of the nuclear variety. Led by guards Vyctorius Miller, Jaylen Curry and Anthony Roy — all of whom are averaging more than 13 points per game on better than 48% shooting — Oklahoma State has not scored less than 85 (!!!) points in each of its six games, all of which were wins. Head coach Steve Lutz’s squad rebounds at an average rate, which means they will probably out-rebound the ‘Cats by double-digits.
I know it’s Thanksgiving, but if the Greenbrier Tip-Off is anything to go by, it’s probably best for Northwestern fans to watch this one alone.
