NORMAL, Ill. - The Illinois State Redbirds will look to pull back into their winning ways, when the squad hosts the Drake Bulldogs on Wednesday evening in an 8 p.m. tip-off.
QUICK HITTERS
• Over the past 10 seasons in the NCAA, few schools have made a jump from one season to the next better than ISU. From last season to this season the Redbirds have jumped 332 position rankings and .102 percentage points and currently rank seventh in the country in three-point field goal percentage
• This season Illinois State has had five games with five or fewer turnovers in a game, which is tied for the third-most this season in the NCAA
• ISU forward Chase Walker gets fouled at a rate of 7.8 fouls per 40 minutes, which is the sixth-highest rate in the NCAA
• This season the Redbirds have had 12 games with single-digit turnovers, which is tied for the most by an ISU squad in a season since at least 1988-89
• If maintained, ISU's .394 three-point field goal percentage is on pace to be the fourth-best single-season average in school history
• Against Indiana State, Caden Boser scored his 1,000th career point between his time at UMKC, Valdosta State, and Illinois State.
• Jack Daugherty's 41 three-point baskets are the eighth-most in a season by an ISU freshman in program history
• Illinois State guards Johnny Kinziger (10th) and Malachi Poindexter (38th) rank inside of the top-40 in career free throw percentage. The Redbirds are one of four schools to have two student-athletes inside of the top-40.
• This season the Illinois State Redbirds have had seven different players lead the team in scoring through the opening 25 games of the season
• Illinois State's win against UAB on November 23 was the program's third game in a four-game stretch where the Redbird opponent was picked as the preseason favorite in their conference: Ohio (Mid-American Conference), McNeese (Southland Conference), and UAB (American Athletic Conference). In those games, the Redbirds went 2-1
• The Redbirds are one of just of three schools in the country to rank inside of the top-15 in the NCAA in both three-point field goals per game (10.4 - 14th) and three-point field goal percentage (.394 - seventh)
• This season Illinois State has a KenPom adjusted offensive percentage of 113.4, which is the highest by a Redbird squad in the KenPom era (1996 to present)
• Dalton Banks' three blocked shots against Saint Louis is tied for the fourth-most in the country this season in a game by a player 6-2 or shorter
• Ten times this season, ISU has had games with shooting splits of at least .500/.400/.750. No other team in school history has had more than four such game splits in a single season, and the Redbird's total is the most in the country this season
• ISU guard Jordan Davis and forward Caden Boser are the among the top players in the conference of each program's eighth- and ninth-leading scorers
SCOUTING THE BULLDOGS
Drake comes into the mid-week meeting against the Redbirds riding a 10-game win streak, the second-longest win streak in the country with recent wins over Indiana State, Murray State, and Southern Illinois.
In the win against the Sycamores, by an 85-81 score in overtime, Drake had four players reach double-figure scoring, led by Bennett Stirtz who had 20 points and seven assists in the win. Daniel Abreu scored 18 points while Isaiah Jackson scored 13 and Tavion Banks 11. Abreu pulled down a team-high eight rebounds, while Cam Manyawu grabbed a pair of steals.
Stirtz, who leads the country by averaging 38.9 minutes played per game, scores an average of 18.6 points per game while Abreu and Mitch Mascari average 11.2 and 11.0 points per game each. Banks is just off the double-figure pace at 9.7 points per game, while Manyawu averages 7.4. Stirtz has given out 149 assists with 57 steals - both of which lead the MVC. Manyawu leads the team by averaging .7 rebounds per game, while his 21 blocked shots are also the high-mark on the Bulldog squad.
WHAT A YEAR
With Wednesday's game on February 12, it is one day shy of a year from when Illinois State toppled the Indiana State Sycamores. That game was the top game of the year for Johnny Kinziger. In the seasons worth of games from the Indiana State game through this Wednesday, the now-sophomore has played in 31 games, averaging 15.2 points while making 46.5 percent of his shots from the field, 42.6 percent from long range, and has dished out 102 assists during that span, in which ISU was 19-13.
FOULED A LOT
Illinois State sophomore forward Chase Walker draws an average of 7.8 fouls per 40 minutes played, the sixth-largest total in the country this season.
STRONG WITH THE BALL
Four times this season Illinois State has had games in which it has committed just five or fewer turnovers, five on November 7 at North Dakota State, on December 29 at home against UIC, and on February 1 against Valparaiso, and just four at home against Belmont on January 29. Those are four of the seven lowest single-game turnover totals in program history.
FRESHMAN DEEP MAKES
Through the first 25 games of the season, Illinois State freshman Jack Daugherty has made 40 three-point field goals, which is tied for the eighth-most in a season by a freshman in program history.Â
HIGH ON MAKES AND PERCENTAGE
This season the Redbirds rank seventh in the NCAA in three-point field percentage (.394) and 14th in three-pointers per game (10.4). There are just two other schools to sit in the top-15 in both categories, and the Redbirds have faced off against both this season.
LOW TURNOVERS
This season, through 25 games, Illinois State has a dozen games with single-digit turnovers. Since 1988-89, this season's total is tied for the most in a season, and equeled only the 12 that last season's team put together.
EIGHT IS GREAT AND NINE IS FINE
This season Illinois State has strong depth across its lineup, as the team's eighth- (Jordan Davis) and ninth-leading scorers (Caden Boser) are averaging 5.3 and 4.9 points per game each. Among players who have seen action in at least half of their teams' games, Davis has the fourth-best eighth-player scoring average, while Boser also has the second-best ninth-leading scoring total.
STRONG NEW CLASS
With four signees, the Illinois State men's basketball recruiting class for the 2025 season was ranked 60th in the country according to the 247sports.com team ranking. ISU added forward Nick Allen, guard/forward Isaac Ericksen, and guards Tyreek Coleman and Mason Klabo. Allen, a 6-11 forward from Bradley-Bourbonnais HS, has a national 247sports ranking of 277, and is the top-rated center in the state of Illinois. He was named First Team All-State as a junior. Ericksen, a 6-9 guard/forward from Green Level HS in Cary, North Carolina, was named Second Team All-State as a junior, and is the 13th-rated prospect inside North Carolina. Coleman, a 6-2 guard from Waubonsie Valley HS, was named Third Team All-State as a junior. Klabo, a 6-1 guard from Fargo Davies HS in Fargo, North Dakota, was named First Team All-State three times heading into his senior season, as he is within grasp of the North Dakota boys basketball all-time scoring record.
KENPOM EFFICIENCYÂ
KenPom, the primary statistical and analysis college basketball site, and its work on tempo-based basketball statistics is compared by many to the work of Bill James in baseball. This season Illinois State's adjusted offensive total is 113.4, which is the highest total for ISU in the history of the KenPom ratings, which date back through the 1996-97 season. Stathead basketball has an offensive metric titled Offensive Rating, and ISU's 116.4 this season is nearly 10 points higher than the previous season-high (dating back to the 1996-97 season).
PERCENTAGES ACROSS THE BOARD
Ten times this season the Illinois State men's basketball team has had games where it has made over half of its field goal tries, 40 percent of the three-point attempts, and at least 75 percent from the charity stripe. No other team in school history - outside of this season's team - has had more than four such games in an entire season. The total is the most in the country this season with St. Thomas trailing with nine. Since 2004-05, the most such games in a season by an NCAA Division I school is 11, held by Oklahoma State (2004-05), Michigan (2016-17), South Dakota State (2021-22), and Colorado (2023-24).
EXCITING GAMES
Notable basketball analytics website KenPom has a statistic called Game Excitement, which is a measure of how much the win probability changed over the course of a game (using a win probability algorithm that assumes the teams are of equal strength). This season the Redbirds appear in the list twice within the top 17 games overall, with the No. 15 game coming from Illinois State's 84-83 win over UAB in the Virgin Islands, while the Redbird 99-97 overtime loss at Belmont is the 17th highest. ISU's win over UAB is the only game in the top-23 of the ranking to not have gone into overtime.
HALL OF FAMER DOUG COLLINS
On October 13, Redbird basketball legend Doug Collins was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, the highest honor for anyone associated with the game of basketball. Collins had played and worked in basketball at almost every level including being an All-American at Illinois State, an NBA top overall draft pick, an Olympian in 1972, playing for the Philadelphia 76ers, coaching the Chicago Bulls, Detroit Pistons, Philadelphia 76ers, and Washington Wizards, and an NBA and Olympic broadcaster for ABC/ESPN, CBS, NBC, TNT, and TBS. He was joined in the 2024 Hall of Fame class by 12 others including: Chauncey Billups, Vince Carter, Seimone Augustus, Bo Ryan, Michael Cooper, Walter Davis, Charles Smith, Dick Barnett, Harley Redin, Michele Timms, Jerry West, and Herb Simon.
ALL-AMERICA WATCH LIST
On Thursday, October 31, Illinois State sophomore guard Johnny Kinziger was named to the Bracketeer.org All-American watch list. Eligible conferences for the first-year award include: America East, ASUN, Big Sky, Big South, Big West, CAA, Conference USA, Horizon League, Ivy League, MAAC, MAC, MEAC, MVC, NEC, OVC, Patriot League, SoCon, Southland, SWAC, Summit League, Sun Belt, WAC. The 2025 Bracketeer.Org Non-Power Conference Player of the Year will be announced in the final week of March, 2025.Â
PRESEASON POLL
The Illinois State men's basketball team was picked to finish fourth in the preseason poll, with voters in the poll consisting of school's media, SIDs, and head coaches. Johnny Kinziger was named to the First Team, while Malachi Poindexter was picked on the second team.
