How about the year he led the Wildcats to their only NCAA Tournament appearance?
How do you know Collins actually helped that team?
He recruited Law, Lindsey, McIntosh and Skelly in his first true class.
Thats great. The optimism was palpable.
2013-14, the top 6 players are Olah, Crawford, Lumpkin, Cobb, Demps and Sobolewski, all Carmody guys. Not a bad group. We go 14-19, 6-12. Drew Crawford never smiled the entire season.
2014-15 Demps, Olah, Cobb and Lumpkin are joined by McIntosh, Lindsey and Law. Pretty good group of players. We go 15-17, 6-12.
2015-16 Demps, Olah, Lumpkin, McIntosh, Lindsey and frosh Pardon and Falzon. Law out. Good group of players. 20-12, 8-10. oddly, no NIT.
2016-17 Lumpkin, McIntosh, Lindsey, Law, Skelly and Pardon. frosh Brown and Benson. Falzon injured. An experienced, talented team built on Collins first recruiting class. 24-12, 10-8 NCAA.
2017-18 Everybody is back except Taphorn and Lumpkin. Frosh Gaines plays 18 mpg. 15-17, 6-12.
(Collins lost me during this season as the team was worse than anyone imagined possible)
2018-19 Pardon, Gaines and Law, two transfers and frosh Kopp and Nance. 13-19, 4-16.
2019-20 Kopp, Nance and Gaines, two transfers joined by Buie, Young, Beran. 8-23, 3-17.
2020-21 Kopp, Nance, Young, Gaines, Buie, Beran all back. Audige transfer in. Berry. 9-15, 6-13.
A team of talented players that never got it together.
Meanwhile, Isiah Brown saw his minutes chopped during that horrible 2017-18 season and left NU for the Grand Canyon Antelopes (the school, not the animal).
Rapolas Ivanauskas also got frustrated and left in 2018, becoming Patriot League MVP during NU's disastrous 2018-19 season.
Barret Benson got frustrated and left for SIU in 2019 where he played 27 minutes per game. To his credit he earned his degree from NU in 3 seasons, then left.
Following his 3 years of agony, Miller Kopp bailed out after the 2020-21 season.
If this is what success looks like, you can have it. One winning record in his 8 Big Ten seasons.
Yay Coach Collins!