UNI men’s basketball optimistic despite slow start

CEDAR FALLS — Despite Northern Iowa’s 3-7 start to its 2023-24 season, men’s basketball coach Ben Jacobson remains optimistic about his team.

He’s as eager as ever to go to practice each day and put in the work that’s needed.

After an impressive, 78-73, win last Wednesday at home against Richmond (5-5), the Panthers lost, 84-80, on Saturday at Toledo (5-4) despite a two possession lead at halftime and a season-high 31 points from Bowen Born.

“The (Denver) Broncos this year — I think the Broncos started 1-5 or 1-6 and they won again yesterday to go to 7-6 now,” Jacobson said. “Whether it’s our team or other things that happen to be going on in real time, that stuff makes sense to me, I guess. Sports, life, it’s not a straight line. If it was, we'd all be champs.”

Saturday’s loss to the Rockets included 13 turnovers by UNI, something Jacobson described Monday as a “ball toughness” issue after numerous quick exchanges against Toledo didn’t go in the Panthers’ favor.

And despite its 107-56 loss at Iowa State on Sunday, UNI’s next opponent — Prairie View A&M (4-4) — challenges defensive rebounders and uses its defense in similar ways to Toledo that will immediately test the Panthers.

“(Quick exchanges), it makes the game really difficult. It puts so much pressure on everything else,” Jacobson said. “Your half court defense, your rebounding — you list off the things that are really important (and) you almost have to be perfect in those things when you have those types of quick exchanges.

“A lot of those exchanges happened with our ball handling, our passing and what we did when we had the ball close to the basket. If you want to sum it up you call it ball toughness, you call it ball security.”

With ball security having now shot up UNI’s list of things to work on, Jacobson further explained why he and his staff’s confidence hasn’t been shaken despite sitting four games below .500.

“Having been a part of (this) as a player, an assistant coach and a head coach I could go back to teams in all three of those (instances) and find a team that was in a tough spot from a record standpoint and ended up winning a championship,” Jacobson said. “To me, it’s never about what our record is or isn’t, it’s always about how we’re playing and what are we doing to get better.”

UNI tips off at McLeod Center at 7 Tuesday night against Prairie View A&M (ESPN+).