The NIU basketball team was picked preseason No. 1 in the MAC but failed to live up to the expectations and finished second-to-last. This season was anything but lucky for NIU, but let’s for the moment assume if you have the touch of the Huskies, it is beneficial and will bring you good luck. If that’s the case, here is how the NCAA basketball tournament – now at the Sweet 16 stage – would shake up with the “eight degrees of separation” with that mid-major out in DeKalb’s cornfields.

Kansas over UAB

NIU coach Rob Judson served under Jayhawks coach Bill Self at Illinois his last season before coming to DeKalb.

Nevada over Georgia Tech

Cary Groth, NIU’s athletic director for the past 10 years, will be leaving DeKalb after also graduating and coaching at the school. Groth’s destination? Yep, Nevada.

St. Joes over Wake Forest

Led by player of the year Jameer Nelson, the Hawks are the ultimate Cinderella – at least since Billy Packer said they didn’t deserve their No. 1 seed. St. Joes represents all the mid-major programs out there like NIU.

Oklahoma State over Pittsburgh

The Huskies lost 69-59 to Baylor this season at a tournament in Hawaii. This season, Baylor is playing without many of its players who have gone on to star at other colleges, and one of those is Oklahoma State’s John Lucas III, who runs the team from the point guard position.

Syracuse over Alabama

The Huskies began the season looking strong, narrowly losing to Notre Dame 65-74 on Nov. 24. This season, in its grinding Big East schedule, Notre Dame knocked off Syracuse 84-72 in one of its meetings Feb. 16.

Vanderbilt over Connecticut

The lone MAC representative in the NCAA tournament was Western Michigan. It served a short stay in the March Madness after being toasted in the first round by Vanderbilt.

Illinois over Duke

Judson graduated from and was an assistant coach for the Illini.

Xavier over Texas

Xavier coach Thad Matta was rumored to be in the running for the Illinois head coaching job last season when Self took off for Kansas. Along with Matta was Judson – they both lost out to Southern Illinois’ Bruce Weber.