Independents Hall, Week 1

363 teams play Division I men's basketball. 361 belong to conferences. These are the stories of the other two.

For the first time since the 2014-15 season, we have teams playing Division I basketball that are unaffiliated with conferences. This phenomenon, long associated with teams too new to find conferences immediately or geographic isolates, has since become sort of an unknown entity given the intense need of conference affiliation to secure any sort of tournament invite in the modern era. This is not football — this is not a case where the Notre Dames of the world can compete at a higher standalone level. This is a case of two schools and the stories around them, and our year following them. 

Firstly, let’s meet our two teams.

Chicago State

The first is the Chicago State Cougars, a historically black college on Chicago’s South Side. They’ve long suffered in many athletic pursuits, most notably in men’s basketball, where they have had one (1) season above .500 since the turn of the century. Beyond that, the university has struggled greatly, grappling with the state of Illinois’ budget crisis as well as graduation rates that, for some time, barely cracked the double digits.

Prior to the current season, following the breakup of the Great West Conference in 2013, the Cougars were a member of the Western Athletic Conference (WAC). However, as the always turbulent landscape of college athletics shifted once more in 2021 following the announcements of Oklahoma and Texas to the SEC (and the subsequent ripples throughout), the WAC pivoted to a more southwesterly course, and the Cougars, already geographic outsiders from the off, mutually departed the league at the conclusion of the 2021-22 season. 

This is not the Cougars’ first ride as an independent; after the 2005-06 season, the Cougars left the Summit League (then known as the Mid-Con) to travel as an independent for three seasons. However, that was a different landscape, and the Cougars will no doubt be scrapping to engage various conferences in accession talks shortly. It’s known that they’ve spoken to the MEAC, OVC, and Horizon, but they have not yet had luck in any of those regards.

Hartford

Our other team is the Hartford Hawks, who are in a far more melancholy situation indeed. This season is the Hawks’ last as a Division I competitor — at the conclusion of this year, they will embark on a transition to Division III.

This is not an unforeseen occurrence, a school dropping divisions: longtime favorite of mine Savannah State moved back to Division II as recently as 2019. Even dropping two levels to Division III has precedent: Birmingham-Southern dropped to Division III in 2008 and Centenary did the same not long afterwards. However, the overwhelming sense with these schools was a misfit — whether from Centenary’s lack of enrollment, or the financial woes that have plagued schools like Birmingham-Southern, Savannah State, and Winston-Salem State, a school that never fully completed the Division I transition before dropping. Hartford does not have that sort of impetus.

Hartford’s president and Board of Regents made the decision following the 2020-21 season to move the school’s athletic program down to Division III. This immediately followed the men’s basketball program’s first-ever NCAA Tournament berth that March, making it a stunning development that was met with anger on campus and around the world of college athletics, as many (myself included) saw it as a shortsighted reaction, painfully ignorant of that which the Hawks had just achieved.

Unfortunately, efforts to convince the university to rescind their missive were unsuccessful, and with it, the fate of the Hawks has been sealed. This is their swan song, their final campaign. And it’s off to an inauspicious start; longtime head coach John Gallagher filed a lawsuit against the Board of Regents regarding the decision to leave Division I, then resigned after the university refused to send an athletic trainer to a preseason exhibition. The team is a veritable skeleton crew — its roster depleted after most of the key cogs on its NCAA Tournament team transferred out or graduated — led by an interim coach.

Game recaps

In a sense, these two teams represent two sides of the same coin — both on the fringes of Division I athletics. One is choosing to stick it out by choice, the other has made the choice to exit stage left. We’ll bring you coverage of their entire seasons, keeping you up to speed on every game that these two teams play to the best of our ability with these weekly recaps, coming to you every Saturday (and thereby inclusive of games up to the prior Friday).

So! Let’s get into game talk. Here are this week’s results.

November 7, 2022

Chicago State (0-1) lost @ Northwestern (1-0), 59-85

November 8, 2022

Hartford (0-1) lost vs. Sacred Heart (1-0), 77-70

November 10, 2022

Hartford (1-1) won vs. Northern Vermont-Lyndon, 85-43

November 11, 2022

Chicago State (0-2) lost @ St. Thomas-MN (1-1), 61-83

Chicago State opened with a pair of away games — at Northwestern, a tall task, and against St. Thomas, a D1 newcomer who last year made the very unusual jump from Division III. Both games broke against the Cougars, but not for a lack of effort. Elijah Weaver had 19 against Northwestern, Wesley Cardet Jr. had 18 against St. Thomas, and both players (as well as returning star Jashean Corbett) are averaging 14.5 points per game for the Cougars. 

Hartford, on the other hand, opened with a nailbiter against Sacred Heart in the first of two matches against the Pioneers this year. Though the game was within a point with five minutes to go, the Hawks were unable to overcome the opposition and fell. They rebounded quite well against non-D1 foe Northern Vermont-Lyndon, trouncing the lower-level team to a tune of 85-43 in a game that pretty quickly devolved out of reach after the first ten or so minutes. Briggs McClain averages 22.5 to lead the Hawks in scoring and indeed has his hands in almost every statistical category on offer.

Looking ahead

Altogether, not the best week for our teams here. The Cougars are 0-2, the Hawks are 1-1, and neither team has managed to beat a Division I opponent. Next week looks marginally better, as you can see below:

November 12, 2022

Hartford (1-1) @ St. Francis-PA (0-1)

November 14, 2022

Chicago State (0-2) vs. IUPUI (0-2)

November 16, 2022

Chicago State (0-2) vs. Valparaiso (0-1)

November 17, 2022

Hartford (1-1) @ Boston University (1-1)

Hartford gets a chance to go on the road, though they’ll be comfortably the underdog in both of their games, while Chicago State plays host to a very winnable game against IUPUI on Monday — it will likely be their clearest shot at a Division I win - and then gets a Valparaiso team that no one seems too willing to make heads or tails of yet. The Cougars are going to be dogs in that one, as they’ll be in many of their games this year.

That’s about it, though. So far? 1-3. 0-3 against Division I opposition. We’ll come back next Saturday and get you caught up on that week’s action then.