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Daily Chronicle sports editor Jon Styf and sports reporter John Sahly spend their days covering the area's sports scene, Every week, they give their viewpoint on those local sports.
Today, in the sixth installment of their "Take 2" column, they discuss the Northern Illinois basketball team's past and future:
Styf: Turnover isn't always a bad thing for a 10-win team that lost 10 in a row late in the season. But this past week, with Mike DiNunno and Michael Fakuade adding their names to the list of early exits along with Jake Anderson from the Huskies' basketball team, this is getting ridiculous. Xavier Silas even entered the NBA draft, although he won't hire an agent.
Sahly: Let's start with Silas. I expect he'll be back in DeKalb for his senior season. It's a smart move for a talented junior to get an evaluation from NBA scouts on what he needs to work on next year. I suspect he'll hear something about his defense. After that, this situation has gotten out of hand a little bit, yes?
Styf: It's safe to say what we're referring to, more than anything, is Jake Anderson leaving the school and how Anderson says that situation was handled. Fakuade wasn't a scholarship player and, with Kyree Jones headed to DeKalb, it looked like DiNunno wouldn't be back. But Anderson, that seemed to come out of nowhere. The bad part for NIU is that Jake didn't want his tenure to end. That will look real bad in the future when they try to recruit and players wonder when they'll be shown the door. Now, Jake is looking for a place to land. One place rumored to be in the running is Providence College.
Sahly: And that's a tough way to go out for Jake, especially if it went down the way he said it went down. But the real issue here isn't really that Anderson, DiNunno and Fakuade aren't on the team anymore. That happens all over college basketball every single year. Hundreds of kids transfer/are asked to leave/have to take care of family/quit/leave for the NBA/decide they have to walk away. This isn't new and it darn sure isn't unique. Heck, as a basketball team, NIU might be better off for it. The real issue is how their departures, specifically Anderson's, were handled. It's unfortunate that we haven't heard both sides of this.
Styf: I agree with that 100 percent. And we deal with this every day. When things are going right, we can get as much access as we want to anything. Coaches love you, teams think you're great. But, when things go wrong, everyone clams up. That doesn't make them look good and the longer Ricardo Patton doesn't talk, the more it looks like he is admitting this situation was handled poorly. We try our hardest to get both sides of a story – there are usually two versions of the truth – but when they don't talk it leaves everyone wondering what is really going on.
Sahly: And I don't want to turn this into a question of access. Patton and his staff have been gracious with their time since I've been here – practices open to the media, allowing a kid to start stretching a few minutes later for interviews and our "On the Wire" video series, bending their schedules for interviews with me, etc. I think Patton believes he's taking the high road by not commenting on this situation. Maybe he deserves some benefit of the doubt for that. I honestly don't know. But whether or not Patton realizes it, not commenting allows people to fill in the blanks and confirm their own suspicions. That can't be a good thing for a coach with a 26-62 record.
Styf: And that's what it comes down to as well. If the Huskies had won more games, more players would be begging to stick around and the staff would want them to stay too. Maybe all this turnover will turn into something special for NIU. I just have a hard time believing things are going to suddenly improve. They'll have to soon, or NIU's going to have to make a change.
