Lumberjacks sneak into national spotlight

The owners of the longest active winning streak in Division I do not reside in Durham, N.C., Storrs, Conn., or Austin, Texas.

Nope, the only team in all the land to win its last nine games — and counting — is none other than the Lumberjacks of Northern Arizona, right up Interstate 17 in Flagstaff. The Jacks' 89-83 home win over Sacramento State Saturday ran their record to 15-6 overall and 7-0 in conference less than a year after four losses in their final five games kept them out of the Big Sky tournament for the first time in nine seasons.

They're currently ranked 25th in collegeinsider.com's mid-major top 25.

Aiding the Lumberjacks' cause has been the emergence of 6-foot-9 sophomore center Ryan McCurdy. The Highland High School graduate found a permanent spot in the starting lineup a few weeks prior to conference play and has responded by scoring in double digits five times in the last seven games, including his first career double-double (15 points, 10 rebounds) in Saturday's win over Sacramento State. McCurdy failed to hit double figures in his first 40 games.

The reward for such an impressive run will not be an NCAA tournament berth. NAU will have to win the Big Sky Conference tournament, as always, to earn a ticket to the Big Dance.

However, in part because of their start, the Lumberjacks were selected to play a nationally televised game against Western Kentucky as part of ESPN's BracketBuster Weekend Feb. 17-18 (more on that below).

"There were plenty of other schools to choose from, but I think having the nation's longest winning streak right now was probably a factor in that," NAU coach Mike Adras told the Arizona Daily Sun. "The exposure the basketball program and this institution receives, playing in a national event, you can't buy that. It's priceless."

COSTLY WIN

Tennessee's upset of then-undefeated Florida on Jan. 21 came at a price.

The Southeastern Conference fined the school $5,000 for failing to keep fans from running onto the court, citing a policy put in place in the aftermath of the NBA brawl between Detroit Pistons fans and Indiana Pacers players in 2004. Volunteers coach Bruce Pearl seemed undaunted by the penalty.

"I’m not upset with what happened at all,’’ he told The Associated Press. ‘‘But we have to understand, we have to act like we’ve been there before. It’s not often you beat the No. 2 team in the country.. . . The bottom line is, we can’t have that happen again this year.’’

BRACKET BUSTERS

If you're looking to make a splash in the early rounds of your office pool, don't wait until the brackets are released to find the next Vermont or Valparaiso.

Just look to ESPN's fourth annual BracketBuster Weekend Feb. 17-18, during which 13 games between potential giant-slayers will be televised nationally.

The most intriguing aspect of the matchups, which were revealed Monday, is that the games are not scheduled before the season. Instead, 100 "mid-majors" are placed in a pool prior to the season and then pitted against one another by ESPN using many of the same criteria (RPI, record, strength of schedule, etc.) that the NCAA tournament selection committee uses in March.

The highlighted matchup is between Bucknell, buster of Kansas fans' brackets last March, and No. 24 Northern Iowa. Other televised games include George Mason vs. Wichita State (ranked eighth and fifth, respectively, in the mid-major top 25), Buffalo vs. Iona (ranked 22nd and 15th, respectively) and NAU vs. Western Kentucky (ranked 25th and 10th, respectively).