Northwestern drubs St. Francis at Garden

The Madison Square Garden college basketball schedule annually includes an array of the nation's top teams, a sampling of many of the schools expected to not only make the NCAA Tournament but make a dent in it. So what was Northwestern doing in the first half of the Holiday Festival semifinals Monday night as the featured team facing St. Francis of Brooklyn?

Well, just as last season's schedule included potential mid-major Cinderellas Butler, Gonzaga and Cornell, the Wildcats are being fitted for a glass slipper this year. Yes, they're in the Big Ten, which is a power conference, but that's the key to the story line.

You see, Northwestern is the only member of the six major conferences that never has made the NCAA Tournament field in 72 years even as the field expanded to 68 teams this year. In a recent article about "Chicago's other sports curse," The Wall Street Journal quoted former Wildcat Tim Doyle (St. Dominic) predicting, "If they go 9-9 in the Big Ten, they're getting in. The selection committee is going to get sentimental."

The Wildcats stayed on track by running their early-season record to 8-0 with a 92-61 victory over St. Francis of the Northeast Conference. Northwestern advanced to tonight's final against the winner of the late semifinal between St. John's (5-3) and Davidson (5-4).

The Wildcats were led by John Shurna (26 points, six rebounds), Michael Thompson (14 points) and Drew Crawford (25 points, nine rebounds, eight assists), who is the son of well-known NBA referee Danny Crawford. Northwestern's 1-3-1 zone defense forced 21 turnovers it turned into a 35-6 advantage in points off turnovers, and the Wildcats made 10 of 22 three-pointers.

The Terriers (6-4) were pesky long enough to tie the game at 17, but they couldn't keep up with the frenetic pace set by the Wildcats despite the best efforts of Travis Nichols (19 points, six rebounds), Dre Calloway (14 points) and Akeem Bennett (11 points, seven rebounds).

Northwestern took charge midway through the first half with a 24-5 run for a 41-22 lead. A 9-0 Terriers run to start the second half cut the deficit to seven points, but the Wildcats responded with a 14-2 burst that included 10 points by Crawford to push the lead to 59-40. The Cats finished the game on a 25-5 run.

Former Princeton coach Bill Carmody took over the downtrodden Northwestern program in 2000 and went to work installing the motion offense he learned from Pete Carril. Asked how the Wildcats evolved into a team that led the Big Ten in scoring last season and is averaging 81 points this season, Carmody noted that Carril's teams were high-scoring in the 1970s when he had better talent, such as Brian Taylor and Geoff Petrie.

"The talent level went down, and he coached to win," Carmody said of his mentor. "I've done that before."

But now, Northwestern has talent. It was enough to make the NIT field the past two seasons, and it might be enough to take the next step at long last to the NCAA field.