UNI basketball: Consistent excellence shines yet again

Let's give credit where credit is warranted 

Ben Jacobson is finishing his 10th season as the men's basketball coach at Northern Iowa. Just when it will be finished, of course, remains to be seen. You inevitably err when you write off the Panthers too soon.

I didn't see a repeat trip to the NCAA Tournament in the cards for Jacobson's guys. I thought they lost too much from last year. The offense was built around an AP second-team All-American, center Seth Tuttle. How many AP All-Americans does UNI ever have?

Yet, here we go again. The Panthers knocked off Evansville 56-54 Sunday in the Missouri Valley Conference tournament championship game, and are headed back to the NCAAs. Wow.

The Panthers lost three of their top four scorers, two of their top three assists guys, and their top two rebounders from last season's 31-4 team. But here they are, in the NCAAs after tearing through the MVC tourney for the second-straight season.

UNI got better as the season got longer. Not that we should be a bit surprised, because we've seen this movie before. Jacobson's teams have never had a losing season in MVC play, which is kind of incredible since it's been a pretty good basketball league for much of that time. This is Jacobson's seventh 20-win team.

That kind of consistency is simply excellent.

This season's Panthers are Eastern Iowa-fueled. Wes Washpun, who hit Sunday's game-winning, last-second shot and had a great game, is from Cedar Rapids Washington, Matt Bohannon is from Linn-Mar, Jeremy Morgan and Wyatt Lohaus from Iowa City West. Klint Carlson, who came up so big in the first half Sunday, is from Waverly-Shell Rock.

Arch Madness Finish What. A. Game.Missouri Valley Conference on Sunday, March 6, 2016

What. A. Game.

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These are the guys who beat North Carolina and Iowa State. These are the guys who have beaten Wichita State in Wichita and St. Louis. Wichita State was 10th in the Kenpom.com rankings Sunday morning, ahead of every Big Ten team but Michigan State.

But this team also dropped six of seven MVC games between Jan. 2 and Jan. 23., including four straight defeats by nine points or more. Where was the throwing of the towel, the raising of the white flag? This program? Never.

Now UNI does what it has done three other times under Jacobson, which is to wait a week from the Sunday of the MVC title game until the Sunday the NCAA pairings are announced. Six years ago, it was UNLV and Kansas who were unfortunate enough to be matched up with the Panthers. Last year, UNI drubbed Wyoming in the NCAAs before meeting its match in Louisville.

The team that draws UNI in the first round this year better beat the Panthers. Because the Panthers won't defeat themselves.