Jefferson beat Hononegah on the first night, then lost to Harlem the next. Hononegah lost to Jefferson, then bounced back to beat Boylan. Auburn beat Harlem, then the Huskies turned around and beat Jefferson.
And that was just the first weekend.
If the first two nights are any indication, this could be one of the more exciting conference races in NIC-10 history. Not just between two or three teams, but between four or five or more.
“The conference is really up this year,” Harlem coach Mike Moore said. “In the past, you could argue that the conference had maybe two really good teams. This year, there are four or five very good teams.”
Auburn and Freeport were the only two teams to go unbeaten the first weekend. The Knights started with a 54-46 win at Harlem on Friday.
“Both us and Harlem were going into that game with an unusual amount of pressure because you both want to win so badly because of the high expectations of what you’re going to do this season,” Auburn coach Bryan Ott said. “You know what it means to lose, and you don’t want to get in the hole early as a result of it.
“You knew that even if Boylan and Hononegah won on Friday, one was going to go down on Saturday, and there’s no way around stuff like that this year.”
The last time the conference had this kind of parity was 2004’s four-team race between Hononegah (13-3), Jefferson (13-3), Boylan (12-4) and Freeport (12-4).
There have been three races with five teams in the hunt. The two best were 1968, when four teams tied for first at 10-4 and a fifth finished one game back, and 1982, when Freeport won with a 12-4 record, and Jefferson, Guilford, West and Boylan tied for second at 11-5.
“In any year, you have to take everybody seriously in high school basketball, because the minute you’re not up for somebody, that’s when you get stung,” Ott said.
“But this year, the competitive level of all the teams is so high, and it’s so fierce, that you know there’s a little bit more pressure not to have any missteps.”
Because there are so many good teams in the NIC-10, there are going to be big games almost every night. Friday’s matchups include Auburn (5-1, 1-1 NIC-10) at Freeport (5-2, 2-0) and Harlem (3-2, 1-1) at Hononegah (5-1, 1-1).
“The thing I always know about Freeport is they’re very athletic, and I don’t know of a harder place to play in the conference,” Ott said. “They are fiercely competitive about defending their home court.”
Freeport will travel to East in a rare Thursday game tonight, then there’s a full slate of NIC-10 games Friday. The conference then takes a break for holiday tournaments, with the next round of conference games starting Jan. 9.
Staff reporter Emily Tropp can be reached at 815-987-1385 or etropp@rrstar.com.
