Exhibition Game Thread

Five Questions on Drake versus Upper Iowa:

(1) How good is Upper Iowa?

All signs point to ‘not good’. They were picked to finish 12th out of 14 teams in the pre-season Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference (NSIC), receiving 59 votes (the top 7 teams all had between 113 and 171 points).

Their conference appears to be pretty respectable though, as they had three teams make the Division II pre-season Coaches Poll. Since there’s 23 conferences that comprise DII, having three teams from one conference would indicate to me that they’re fairly respectable.

That said, I don’t think it helps much even if you're in the cellar of a decent conference. Last year, the Peacocks finished (5-22, 4-16 NSIC). That’s struggling pretty hard. While they added quite a few names to their roster for this year, it’s hard to see them being anywhere close to a DII juggernaut.

(2) Who should I keep tabs on?

Matt Lesan (#12, Junior). Lesan appears to be the returning leader from last years team, averaging 13.1 PPG last year while chipping in 2.5 APG and 2.4 RPG. In their first exhibition against UNI, Lesan had 7 points and 5 rebounds while shooting 2-4 from the floor. He is a 6-2 guard from Solon, IA.

Jake Hughes (#13, Freshmen). Hughes was an all 4A standout at Kennedy in Cedar Rapids, IA last year. He was inserted right into the starting lineup this year and had 9 points (3-6 shooting) and 3 rebounds against UNI. He’s a 5-11 guard.

(3) What’s the makeup of the rest of their team?

Other than Hughes, the juniors makeup the rest of the starting lineup. From there, they have four sophomores and the rest are newcomers (transfers or incoming freshmen).

It looks like they plan a ton of people – 14 people got into the game against UNI and 11 of them saw double digit minutes. While they all started, the juniors only accounted for 39% of the total 200 minutes played against UNI (5 players x 40 minutes = 200 minutes). Shows you that they definitely got all of the rest of the team involved.

(4) How did they do in their first game?

Upper Iowa lost to UNI 67-39. While the final score was very lopsided, UNI actually only led 38-31 with 15 minutes left. It’s tough to get a read on any of these early season games, but if they could keep it tight for a half against UNI, maybe they’ll give us a tight half as well.

(5) What’s your prediction?

We weren’t as good of a defensive ballclub as UNI was last year, tough to think that would continue into this season as well. We are probably more athletic, however, and that goes a long way when you’re mixing it up with someone from a lower conference. The speed of our newbies and a healthy Josh Young is really going to show on Saturday.

Drake 68, Upper Iowa 51.