By putting big-name opponents on its non-conference schedule, the NIU women’s basketball program hopes to become a big name itself.

With NCAA Division I powerhouses like Old Dominion (NIU lost 81-69 Friday), North Carolina State, Nevada-Las Vegas, New Orleans and Illinois on the first half of the schedule, coach Jane Albright thinks her Huskies will know where they stand early in the season.

How well NIU plays against its non-conference opponents might determine what the Huskies are doing late in the season.

“Our non-conference schedule is geared for two things,” Albright said. “First, we want it to get us ready for our conference schedule, and second, we hope we can get some recognition and get a bid to the NCAA tournament. We won’t blow out any of those nationally-recognized teams, but we have to play a national-caliber schedule if we want to be a national-caliber team.

“It’s (playing top teams) also a way to showcase the game and educate our fans. It’s part of having a total program.”

Another part of the NIU program is scheduling schools geographically located near hometowns of Huskie players. Albright said NIU schedules games of this kind to enable a player’s relatives and friends to see them play. Outside of the aforementioned non-conference games, NIU will play Minnesota (for Denise Dove, New Hope, Minn.), Creighton (Kris Weis, Harlan, Iowa) and Western Illinois (Tammy Hinchee, Cuba, Ill.).

In fact, a Dec. 6 date at Northwestern is the only game the Huskies have scheduled without NIU players’ hometowns or national recognition as a reason. Albright said Northwestern, a Big Ten representative, will be a challenge particularly because of a strong recruiting class a year ago.

NIU will play its other two Big Ten opponents—Illinois (away, Jan. 5) and Minnesota (home, Dec. 17)—along with Creighton (home, Jan. 10) and Western Illinois (Dec. 1) in single-game situations.

The remainder of NIU’s non-conference slate will come in tournament play.

Fifteenth-ranked (Street and Smith pre-season ratings) North Carolina State will be a main attraction at NIU’s 6th annual Fastbreak Fest (Dec. 3 and 4), but Albright said the other two schools (along with NIU) in the tourney, Butler and Temple, have high quality programs also.

“We didn’t want to bring three teams in here and win our own tournament and have people say, ‘So what,'” Albright said. “It’s got to mean something, and it would if we won it. We’ve never won this tournament, and realistically, this could be the year that we do.”

The other two invitationals NIU will participate in will be the Nevada-Las Vegas/7-Up Desert Classic (in Las Vegas Dec. 9 and 10) and the University of New Orleans Holiday Tournament (Dec. 30 and 31).

Albright said both UNLV and New Orleans were in and out of the Top 20 last season. Kent State and Sam Houston State are the other participants in the UNLV tourney, while Dartmouth and Mississippi State are the other two squads NIU will see in New Orleans.