UNI men’s basketball isn’t discouraged by loss to first-place Indiana State

CEDAR FALLS — Getting back to work has been Northern Iowa men’s basketball coach Ben Jacobson’s message since his team’s 77-66 home loss on Sunday to first-place Indiana State.

With two months of Missouri Valley Conference games remaining, Jacobson wasn’t about to overreact to one loss. Rather, he seemingly made a point to continue speaking about the confidence and belief he has in this team.

“I’ll tell ya the last thing I told the guys — we gotta get ready for Wednesday (against Illinois-Chicago),” Jacobson said. “We saw a good team at Missouri State and played a good basketball game. (Sunday) we didn’t play a bad basketball game. We played against a really good team.

“We can learn plenty from (Sunday’s) game, but we need to get ready for Wednesday.”

Jacobson’s unwavering confidence in his team might simply sound like coach speak, but he explained Monday how the amount of time that continues to be invested outside of practices by his players is what keeps his belief intact.

“This group has continued to do a really good job of spending time in the gym,” Jacobson said. “It’s something that I talk about often with our players and that could be any part of the season. It’s something that I go back to and refer to a lot — hard work matters. Confidence comes from hard work. This group has done a really good job of that.”

Getting back to work like Jacobson is telling his team to do may look different in the short term for Nate Heise, however.

The junior guard — who is second on the team in scoring — has been held in single digits the past two games and in three of UNI’s four conference games.

It’s safe to say at this point of the season, Heise’s play has caught the attention of opponents, especially those in the MVC, something that’ll require additional work in the film room to bounce back from.

“(It’s) correct that he’s going to be guarded a little bit differently in (conference) games and he has moved up into the top two or three in terms of the scouting report,” Jacobson said. “You continue to work. You get in and you watch, now how are they guarding me? You study it so then you can go back to work and make some adjustments and find ways to attack what they’re doing to you.”

Jacobson added that along with studying film, Heise will simply benefit from playing more against opposing defenses that are making him more of a priority.

“Nate’s going to be just fine,” Jacobson said. “He’s going to have a terrific two months for us, but this is going to be part of the process for him.”

Another home conference game awaits Heise and the Panthers (7-8, 1-3 MVC) Wednesday night.

Illinois-Chicago (8-7, 1-3) — coming off a 70-64 home win against Valparaiso on Saturday — brings its second-ranked MVC defense to McLeod Center for a 7 p.m. tipoff (KCRG 9.2).

“They’ve been really good defensively. And they do it a couple of different ways,” Jacobson said. “One of the things that they do is switch all five defenders. You see that from time to time, (but) you don’t see it very often.”