STATE OF THE UNION SPORTS REPORT

are you looking for the worst basketball in the nation? then go no farther than the state of illinois where i have never seen such a collective group of collegiate crap in twenty years. of the 12 teams i investigated, just ONE, illinois state  has a winning league record at 3-2. the other 11 teams are ALL BELOW .500 in league play and nine of those have overall losing records. just pathetic.

the worst?  no doubt it's NORTHWESTERN, who get hammered night after night in the big ten unless they're playing the most over rated team in the country which happens to be ILLINOIS who were embarrassed by the wildcats a few days ago. 

i have long advocated illinois being dropped by the BIG TEN in both football & basketball and being reassigned to the MAC where they would at least be competitive. 

NORTHWESTERN basketball should apply for entry into the IVY LEAGUE where they could at least be a middle of the road basketball team and not have to worry about scholarships, which are not allowed in that conference. rich kids don't need financial help anyway.

AND NOW HERE'S MY IDEA FOR THE REST:
you want a competitive conference where fans could stay excited thru most of the year?  check these current records:

UIC  5-12.   NIU   7-8.  LOYOLA  7-10.  WESTERN  7-9. SIU-EDWARDSVILLE  4-13.  BRADLEY  6-12. SOUTHERN 6-12.

and let's not forget the inflated record (10-8) of DE PAUL, who have beaten such power houses as lewis college, grambling, wright state, florida atlantic, chicago state, houston baptist and the aforementioned northwestern.  see how easy it is to inflate your record?

we can also add ILLINOIS STATE to the garbage pile as they also got to 10-7 in the same manner as the blue demons.

so add depaul and isu and you suddenly have 9 teams all located within 150 miles of one another. we call the conference THE BOTTOM FEEDERS, save tons of travel money and have a conference tournament to see what team gets one of the play-in games for the NCAA march dance and the excitement would be endless for the students as opposed to the basket vomit we're now offered on a daily and yearly basis when all of those teams are already eliminated for any serious consideration.

think about it. it makes sense.