With NIU’s men’s basketball team chalking up win after win, the Huskies are poised on the brink of immortality, at least at NIU.

The fabled 1971-72 NIU squad compiled a 21-4 record and enshrinement in the Huskie Hall of Fame. This year’s edition is putting up similar numbers, 18-2 with seven regular-season games left, but the 90’s version of the Huskies has a chance to achieve a landmark that the 70’s squad missed: postseason play.

One of the main attractions that prompted NIU to join the Mid-Continent Conference this season was the loop’s automatic NCAA bid for its tournament champion.

So far, NIU has been tearing through the M-C with a 9-1 mark with Wisconsin-Green Bay, the authors of NIU’s only conference loss, right behind with a 7-2 record. But all the records go out the window once the M-C tournament starts at Green Bay on March 3.

Even if the Huskies don’t win the tournament, their outstanding record is sure to draw the attention of the NCAA and NIT selection committees. Western Illinois coach Jack Margenthaller, whose squad has tasted defeat twice this season at the hands of the Huskies, feels the M-C Conference is deserving of sending three teams to postseason action.

“We’re going to get two teams in the NCAA and one in the NIT,” Margenthaller said. “If not, it’s a travesty.”

NIU’s status as one of the favorites to earn a tournament bid would be greatly enhanced with a win over 15th-ranked Nebraska at Lincoln on Feb. 18. The Cornhuskers match is one of five road games that the Huskies face in their final seven outings.

But road matches haven’t proved to be a problem of late for the Huskies who have won eight of nine away from home this season. NIU is currently riding a six-game winning streak that began with impressive road wins against Akron and Cleveland State.

“When you win a lot, you get hungrier,” NIU head coach Jim Molinari said. “I want the people at Northern to realize this is a special season. I hope they’ll be back (at Chick Evans Field House) for the last two home games because we really need them.”

For the record, those two games are against Cleveland State, Feb. 23, and Akron, Feb. 25. The Huskies have compiled a 21-2 fieldhouse record in Molinari’s two seasons as head coach, which some would say constitutes proof that the fieldhouse is a tough place to play.

“I enjoyed the heck out of it,” Margenthaller said after his squad lost a heartbreaking 59-57 decision to NIU Monday night. “I like the enthusiasm and the noise. Tough, no, exciting, yes.”