Chris Collins has Northwestern back on college basketball’s biggest stage

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Winning is the only way to maintain job security in sports with the exception of Little League teams and maybe Chris Collins at Northwestern.

Harsh? Perhaps, but a quick glance at his record over the last 10 seasons, producing just three winning seasons, proves it’s deserved. Sure, Collins led the program to its first-ever NCAA Tournament berth in 2017 but he followed it up with five consecutive losing seasons.

And thus, this time last year, his coaching seat began to heat up when athletic director Derrick Gragg publicly called on Collins to right the ship.

“I never viewed it like that,” Collins said when asked if he was coaching for his job this year. “I’m super-competitive. It was about being the best for my guys, that’s how I come into every year.”

If that’s how he comes into every year what was the difference from 2022 to 2023?

Last season, NU finished 15-16 overall and 7-13 in Big Ten play. This year, they’re back in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since making history in 2017. Collins’ players can summarize the shift with one word: trust.

“College basketball is a business,” senior forward Robbie Beran said. “You have to do what you have to do. I’m speaking from an athletic-department standpoint. But we’re all in this locker room. We believe in Coach, he brought us together. Even in the turmoil or with rumors spreading around we just tried to focus on inside the locker room.”

Going back to last offseason, following the transfers of Pete Nance to North Carolina and Ryan Young to Duke, the players that remained adopted a mentality intent on proving outsiders wrong.

Collins’ group opened 10-2 before conference play began. They followed with wins against nationally ranked Big Ten opponents including NU’s first-ever win over an AP No. 1 team, Purdue on Feb. 12.

By the time the buzzer sounded on their last conference game, a win against Rutgers on the road, Northwestern had earned its highest Big Ten regular-season finish since 1958-59. Two days later, Collins was named Big Ten coach of the year.

As far as a response to pressure, it doesn’t get much better than that.

“From the moment the season ended last year to where we are now Coach made the statement, ‘This is who we are. This is what we do. We’re going to do anything we have to do to prove people wrong,’ ” senior guard Boo Buie said.

NU’s defense is one of the best in the country, holding opponents to an average of 62.5 points. That ranks 18th nationally and second in the Big Ten. Chase Audige, named Big Ten defensive player of the year, is the defensive anchor.

Tuesday he was named one of four finalists for the Naismith Defensive Player of the Year award.

Audige, NU’s second-leading scorer averaging 13.8 points, is coming off a six-point performance in the team’s Big Ten Tournament loss to Penn State. The grind-it-out game was a glimpse of what fans will see when NU meets No. 10 Boise State on Thursday (6:30 p.m., TruTV).

“Our defense is such a big part of our game,” Audige said. “Some nights our offense might struggle but at the end of the day we have to bring our defense wherever we go.”

In a year, Collins has taken his team from an afterthought in the Big Ten to the college game’s biggest stage. In the process, he has solidified his status as the right man for the job of making Northwestern a university known for its basketball program.

To truly say he has taken Northwestern a step further, he needs to develop sustained success.

It starts with a win Thursday.

“Coming the second time is gratifying,” Collins said. “If you go once, it’s great but it can almost be a one-hit wonder type of deal. To stamp it a second time will help us as we continue to build for the future.”