Primarily a collection of news links about all 12 Horizon League teams on a daily basis, culled from online newspapers, school athletic websites, the conference website, and school newspapers, plus some other content from time to time.
Opening day. More than 150 games, and the first ones tip before most of us
have had coffee.
C Games
#282 Cleveland State at #106 Penn State (-19.6), 5 PM ET, B1G+ First game of the Bob Dunn era. First game of the Tanisha Wright era.
Could Penn State be on upset alert?
#89 Murray State (-4.5) at #164 Southern Indiana, 7 PM ET, ESPN+ Halli Poock’s senior debut. She was last season’s Missouri Valley
Player of the Year at about 22 points a game. Southern Indiana is no slouch
of a program.
#132 Belmont at #61 Princeton (-12.6), 7:30 PM ET, ESPN+ Princeton has been the Ivy standard for most of the last decade.
Belmont doesn’t schedule soft in the non-conference.
Tuesday, November 3
Pretty light. Monday took most of the oxygen.
C Games
#102 Green Bay at #6 Duke (-24.5), 7 PM ET, ACCNX Duke opens at
Cameron, and we get our first look at Toby Fournier and the new-look Blue
Devils. Green Bay has been a Horizon power forever and doesn’t rattle in
loud gyms.
Thursday, November 5
B Games
#114 Illinois State at #115 Dayton (-2.7), 7 PM ET, ESPN+ One
spot apart in T-Rank. Illinois State made the WNIT championship game but
lost Doneelah Washington (16.7 points and 8.6 rebounds) to Ole Miss. Dayton
turned it over on 22% of its possessions last season, bottom fifth
nationally, and has to replace Nayo Lear and Nichole Stephens. Neither will
be ranked, and both could be near the bubble by February. Valley vs. A-10
games like this come up on Selection Sunday.
C Games
#135 UIC at #111 Robert Morris (-4.8), 4 PM ET, ESPN+ Robert
Morris went 18-12 in Chandler McCabe’s second season and lost in the first
round of the Horizon tournament. UIC was the seven seed in the Valley. Both
are trying to climb into the top half of their leagues. A good
late-afternoon option.
Friday, November 6
Lots of good mid-major games tonight. Clear the evening.
B Games
#131 Northern Iowa at #51 South Dakota State (-14.5), 7 PM ET, MidCo
Sports Two of the best mid-major programs of the last decade. UNI’s streak
of five straight national postseason trips ended last year, and Tanya
Warren, in her 20th season, will want it back. Jenna Twedt (14.7 PPG, 84
threes) is the one to watch if UNI wants to pull off the upset. UNI never
gives away a night.
#117 Rice vs. #89 Murray State (-3.6), 8:30 PM ET, ESPN+ (Richmond) Murray went 31-4, won the Valley and made the NCAA Tournament, and
four starters are back: Halli Poock (22.7 PPG), Sharnecce Currie-Jelks (17.5
PPG and 11.7 RPG), Haven Ford (16.9 PPG) and Keslyn Secrist (12.9 PPG).
Murray plays fast, takes care of the ball, and gets to the line (96th
percentile in free-throw rate). Its weakness is defense, which was in the
bottom quarter nationally. Rice went 29-6 and 17-1 in the American, and its
defense held opponents to a 42% effective field goal percentage (94th
percentile). Rice will have to keep up in a points game, or slow it down
enough to make Murray guard.
#62 South Florida (-4.8) at #132 Belmont, 8:30 PM ET, ESPN+ Two
programs starting over. USF hired Kristy Curry from Alabama (554 career
wins, 14 NCAA Tournament bids) and added seven transfers, including Amourie
Porter (16.9 PPG at Winthrop). Belmont lost its top five scorers and brought
in UT Martin’s Kenley McCarn (16.3 PPG). Belmont is rarely an easy trip.
C Games
#175 Drake at #38 Kansas (-22.6), 12 PM ET, ESPN+ A Valley team
at Allen Fieldhouse at lunchtime. Drake is coming off a 12-20 season, which
is weird to see from a program that’s been at or near the top of the Valley
for most of the last decade. Hanging around in Lawrence would be a good
first sign.
Saturday, November 7
C Games
#264 Detroit Mercy at #294 Valparaiso (-1.6), 2 PM ET, ESPN+ SICKO GAME. Can Valpo win a game? Find out at 2 PM on a Saturday.
Sunday, November 8
The best day of the week, and it’s not close. Clear your afternoon and check
your breaker.
B Games
#89 Murray State vs. #61 Princeton (-3.4), 12 PM ET, ESPN+ (Richmond) The weekend's best style clash. Murray played at a 94th-percentile
pace last season. Princeton was in the 13th percentile. Princeton went 26-4
and won the Ivy, but it has a new coach in Lauren Gosselin and lost Madison
St. Rose to Notre Dame. It still has four senior guards, including Skye
Belker (43.0% from three) and Fadima Tall (13.0 points, 7.4 rebounds, 2.5
steals). Whoever controls the pace probably wins.
#59 Columbia (-5.3) at #132 Belmont, 3:30 PM ET, ESPN+ Columbia
went 11-3 in the Ivy and lost its Ivy Madness semifinal to Harvard by two in
overtime. Belmont got upset by Evansville in the Valley quarterfinals. Two
teams with something to prove, and Columbia is favored on the road. The last
game of Griffith’s suspension.
I've been hyping up new Northern Illinois head coach Matt Majkrzak so much
this offseason that I'm actually inclined to totally ruin my sleep schedule
for the week and stay up to watch this 3 AM tilt. Some sacrifices are worth
making.
The Huskies didn't help my dilemma when their one on-record October
exhibition game was a 79-66 victory over typical MAC power Toledo. Obviously
it's just an exhibition that we have no box score for, but that was a
matchup that the Rockets won by double digits twice last year. This is not
your Northern Illinois group of years past.
Majkrzak's Northern Michigan team led all of D-II in offensive rating last
year, and given he's bringing two starters and reuniting with a third former
player in Northern Iowa's Max Weisbrod (38% from deep last year), it's fair
to expect this group to be offensive-minded. At the same time, this team is
not all that athletic and I would expect them to rarely look out in
transition for offense. Only four teams in all of D-II last year ran a fewer
percentage of their possessions in transition than Northern Michigan.
With that in mind, Grambling State will certainly have the length and
athleticism edge. Head coach Patrick Crarey recruited heavily from the JUCO
space, adding 6-foot-6 point guard Grigorije Avramovic, 6-foot-6 twin wings
Antoine and Antonio Shannon, and 6-foot-9 forward Tyler Bey. They also bring
in former 4-star, 7-foot-1 big man Isaiah Miranda to man the middle.
Even though Grambling State will win the athleticism battle, it will face an
uphill battle because it faces Majkrzak with ample prep time. This is a head
coach that famously pre-scripts plays and lineup changes for the first 30
minutes of a game. The season-opener feels like the best time to have a
fully-scouted out plan with that type of strategy.
This game should not be fast; expect the final score to be much lower than
the BUR projection. But unless Grambling's length and pressure totally gets
the Huskies' well-schemed sets all disoriented, the offensively-skilled
group should be able to pick apart its opponent. Northern Illinois should
win comfortably by way of "death by a thousand paper cuts." -
Matthew Winick
Noteworthy: Leading scorer and former Chartiers Valley star Aislin
Malcolm has graduated, but the Colonials will be bolstered by a handful of
former WPIAL standouts in London Creach, Mallory Daly, Ava Leroux and Meghan
Murray.
Wright State’s Clint Sargent gets a hug after a game against
Bellarmine on Friday, Oct. 16, 2026, at the Nutter Center in
Fairborn. DAVID JABLONSKI / STAFF
DAVID JABLONSKI / STAFF
Wright State
Returning players: 5.
Top returner: Kellen Pickett, a 6-9 sophomore forward, averaged 8.5
points last season.
Newcomers: 9.
Top newcomer: CJ O’Hara, a 6-4 junior guard, averaged 14.1 points
last season at Green Bay.
Local connection: Isaiah Williams, a Beavercreek graduate, is a
sophomore guard. He redshirted last season.
Program history: This is Wright State’s 40th season in Division I.
The program began in 1970 and won a Division II national championship in
1983. The Raiders are 1-5 in five NCAA Division I tournament appearances. It
beat Bryant in the First Four at UD Arena in 2022.
State of the program: Wright State finished 23-12 overall and 15-5 in
the Horizon League last season. It won the regular-season and tournament
championships and earned its third NCAA Tournament berth in the last nine
years.
Preseason expectations: Wright State is the preseason favorite in the
Horizon League.
Opener: Wright State plays Air Force at the Nutter Center in the
Stars, Stripes and Flight Classic. The game is sold out. Air Force is No.
265 in the Pomeroy ratings. Wright State is No. 157.
197. Oakland Golden Grizzlies-Last Season Ranking: 187
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Greg Kampe (43rd season)
Player to know: Chris Field Jr.
Oakland is always a team that's hard to judge. That is usually the case when a legend who's been part of college basketball longer than I have been alive is coaching. Coach Kampe has seen everything the game has to offer, and his most versatile teams always surprise and win the Horizon League. The 2026-2027 roster has a lot of guys who can do a lot of different things with no stars. Is this another surprise run to the NCAA Tournament for the Golden Grizzlies?
163. Robert Morris Colonials- Last Season Ranking: 220
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Andrew Toole (17th season)
Player to know: Ace Valentine
Robert Morris is rolling and has now finished in the top two of the Horizon League for two straight seasons. The 2026-2027 team will be another year the Colonials finish near the top of the Horizon League. The roster is well balanced, with its stars and plenty of depth. Coach Toole will make Robert Morris must-see TV three years in a row.
155. Wright State Raiders- Last Season Ranking: 190
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Clint Sargent (3rd season)
Player to know: Dominic Pangonis
The Raiders dominated the Horizon League, then headed to the NCAA Tournament, where Wright State gave the Cavaliers everything they wanted. Coach Sargent has Wright State putting up a ton of points without shooting a high volume of threes. There is no reason to believe the Raiders will finish anywhere other than first place in the Horizon League. They have earned the benefit of the doubt.
Northern Illinois’ season-opener against Grambling State tips off on Monday morning at 3 a.m. Eastern Time. But in head coach Matt Majkrzak’s mind, it’s a Sunday game.
The Huskies are taking part in the Field of 68 Tip-off Marathon in Rock Hill, S.C., taking the graveyard shift against the Tigers as part of an eight-game event split between two venues. Majkrzak, like most coaches, has never coached a game at 3 a.m. before, so he had to consider all possibilities in terms of altering his team’s practice schedule to prepare. He landed on not changing too much.
With another game looming on Thursday against Tulsa, he can’t afford to throw off the schedule long-term. So he opted against setting a whole week of practices for late nights. Until NIU lands in South Carolina on Friday, everything is business as usual.
The flight is scheduled for noon, which Majkrzak says means that the team has to be up at 8 a.m., ready to go. They’ll land in South Carolina later that evening. Then, it’s a late-night practice at 11:30 p.m.
Once the Huskies run through practice on Friday night into Saturday morning, Majkrzak wants the players to stay awake for a few more hours.
“We’re going to room check at 4 a.m.,” Majkrzak told Mid-Major Madness. “And they have to be awake.”
After the checks are complete, he wants the players to go to bed, trying to adhere to a 4 a.m. to noon sleep schedule – sounds like a normal college kid sleep schedule on a Friday night if you ask me. There are no team activities on Saturday until 1 p.m.
“If we can sleep in until noon on Saturday, and then sleep until noon on Sunday,” Majkrzak said. “All of the sudden it just becomes kind of a normal later game night.”
There’s only one night of late-night practice for the Huskies, as Majkrzak wants to keep everything as simple as possible. Practice on Saturday will be at 5 p.m.
NIU’s assigned shootaround time is also set for 5 p.m. on Sunday evening, so they’ll walk through final preparations for Grambling State then.
“The biggest thing is not overthinking it,” he said. “Not putting doubt in their minds.”
NIU leaves Rock Hill to fly back home just “four or five hours” after the Grambling game, and Majkrzak wants his players to go to sleep at a normal hour on Monday so the team can get back to work, preparing for Tulsa, on Tuesday.
He views the 3 a.m. tip as an extension of Sunday, and Monday as the team’s off-day, even if they won’t sleep between the game day and the end of the off-day.
Majkrzak, who scripts every offensive possession of every game, says that he had the Grambling State script tentatively finished before NIU’s first exhibition, but made adjustments based on the exhibitions. He finalized the script on Tuesday.
The final variable for Majkrzak was the possibility of his beloved Brewers playing in Game 7 of the World Series on Saturday. Fortunately for him, he won’t have to schedule around it. Milwaukee won in five on Wednesday night.
293. Detroit Mercy Titans- Last Season Ranking: 298
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Mark Montgomery (3rd season)
Player to know: Ayden Carter
Three points separated the Titans from the NCAA Tournament. Head coach Mark
Montgomery has Detroit Mercy on the verge of being the next yearly Horizon
League tournament team. The Titans retained two key contributors from last
year and added a lot of scoring in the transfer portal. The Titans may
finally get over the hump this year.
284. Fort Wayne Mastodons-Last Season Ranking: 218
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Jon Coffman (13th season)
Player to know: DeAndre Craig
Not to sound like a broken record, but the Mastodons are another team who
will go as far as their defense takes them. The defense is never very good,
and it has been the reason that Fort Wayne has lost games they should
normally win. The elite, heavy three-point-efficient offense is always one
of the best in the country. The defense needs to improve for Fort Wayne to
make the NCAA Tournament.
277. Cleveland State Vikings- Last Season Ranking: 251
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Rob Summers (2nd season)
Player to know: Obie Bronston Jr.
It will never matter how good the offense is if your team gives up 86 points
per night. That was the case for the Vikings last season, when they won only
11 games. The 2026-2027 season might be a long one as well. Cleveland State
doesn't have a single player on the roster who earned a minute in the
2025-2026 season, and coach Summers didn't do much to address his defensive
issues, at least not on paper.
259. Milwaukee Panthers- Last Season Ranking: 211
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Bart Lundy (5th season)
Player to know: Danilo Jovanovich
2025-2026 was the first year the Panthers didn't win 20 games and weren't a
top-tier team in the Horizon League under coach Lundy. The adage that
defense wins championships rings true again; they had their worst defense
under Lundy last season. It won't surprise anyone when the Panthers win
20-plus games and compete for the NCAA Tournament in 2026-2027.
237. Youngstown State Penguins- Last Season Ranking: 173
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Ethan Faulkner (3rd season)
Player to know: Jeff Nwankwo
The Horizon League is all about scoring, and the Penguins have done their
part with an explosive offense built around a huge volume of threes and
extremely efficient shooting. The defense revolves around preventing the
three-point shot; volume was low, but the percentage was high, and that
alone cost Youngstown State some games last year. Expect the Penguins to
shoot a ton of threes again in 2026-2027, but the defense should be better.
Youngstown State will be dangerous in the Horizon in 2026-2027.
230. Green Bay Phoenix- Last Season Ranking: 339
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Doug Gottlieb (3rd season)
Player to know: Marcus Hall
The Green Bay program appears to have been resurrected under coach Gottlieb.
The Phoenix play physical defense that forces teams to play at an
uncomfortable pace. Offensively, it is one of the slowest paces in the
country with efficient shooters at all five spots. Green Bay is a tough
matchup and can beat some power schools. The Phoenix are a top-tier team in
the Horizon.
218. Northern Kentucky Norse- Last Season Ranking: 284
Conference: Horizon League
Head Coach: Darrin Horn (8th season)
Player to know: Eric Acker
Northern Kentucky has been consistent under Coach Horn. Northern Kentucky
consistently has a winning record and consistently finishes in the middle of
the Horizon League. The Norse have made the tournament under Coach Horn but
have never been good enough to get themselves over the hump. Northern
Kentucky will have a winning record but still won't make the tournament.
IU Indy (No. 289) played at the breakneck pace Ben Howlett brought with him from D-II West Liberty. The Jaguars have more depth and talent this year to find more success in the win column playing track meets in his second year.
Milwaukee (No. 270) didn’t have to look far to find its portal reinforcements. It added a pair of former Marquette players this spring in Tre Norman and Al Amadou.
Detroit Mercy (No. 264) experienced March heartbreak last season after blowing an 11-point lead with under 10 minutes to play in the Horizon title game. That would’ve completed a remarkable turnaround from 1–31 in 2023–24 to the Big Dance in 2026, but it wasn’t to be.
The summer roster chaos created by the dozens of eligibility lawsuits have led to some strange player/team marriages. Green Bay (No. 247) made a couple of fifth-year splashes with Orlando Lovejoy (15.8 ppg at Detroit Mercy) and Aidan Hadaway (14.4 ppg at Ohio) after losing a pair of projected starters to summer injuries.
