Last week, the Frontier Conference held its annual media day for the upcoming 2024-25 basketball season. The men’s teams led it off on Tuesday and the preseason poll came out with MSU-Northern finishing fourth out of six teams with 12 votes.
Head coach Shawn Huse made a distinction that early on in October, the team is not ready to play a game, but said with all the moving pieces of 18 players, including 10 who are either freshmen or transfers, that the Lights will get to where they need to be.
“We’re not quite as ready for a game because we’ve got a lot of new guys,” Huse said. “We need a little bit more work yet.”
“(There’s) love in the room (and) competitive practices,” Huse continued. “These guys are working hard. I do think we recruit great guys here (and) this year is no different.”
“We’ve added more depth and some more size and some more fire power,” Huse said. “I really like this group of guys and they’ve got great respect for the (Frontier Conference), so it’s not going to be easy by any means, but I think we have a chance to do something.”
Huse was joined by redshirt sophomore wing Rogan Barnwell and senior forward Xavier Bailey, who were part of the (11-18) rollercoaster that was 2023-24. Barnwell was asked about some of those losses being close and he said that what he took away last year was the parting words of Huse about keeping poise and passing that along to the newcomers for this year.
“Coach (Huse) always talks about being able to keep our poise in situations like that, so just maintaining that is pretty important in those close games,” Barnwell said. “That’s something that us returners can take away from last year and build off of that.”
Whether it’s rounding out the fall season or 30 degrees below zero, Northern’s home gym is always a travel destination, both for locals and visiting fans alike. Bailey said that playing in the Armory Gym is a community-wide event when people show up.
“All the people that we see and interact with in the community, seeing them in the stands, seeing them yelling your name, (it’s great),” Bailey said. “The kids, they think you’re almost in the NBA.”
“(The Armory Gym is) a great environment,” Bailey continued. “I think it definitely gives us an advantage every time we’re at home.
MSU-N Lights basketball opens up the new season against Embry-Riddle (Arizona) on Sat., Nov. 2 on a neutral court in Billings before playing the home opener against Bushnell University on Mon., Nov. 4.
