On Saturday morning, the NIU men’s basketball team was on display to about 150 fans at the new Convocation Center in an intra-squad scrimmage.

With three 10-minute quarters, the teams were mixed up each quarter so second-year coach Rob Judson could see who played well together.

“The big thing this weekend was to see what teams won,” Judson said. “The freshmen did very well for the first time getting out and playing in front of a crowd. There were far too many turnovers, but that’s something we can work on.”

One of two seniors, 6-foot point guard Jay Bates felt the best performance on Saturday came from the lineup of himself, 6-foot-3 Perry Smith, 6-foot-6 Jamel Staten, 6-foot-6 Marcus Smallwood and 6-foot-7 Rome Sanders, with fellow senior, 6-foot-9 Mike Morrison coming off the bench.

“We are just trying to play hard and show leadership,” Bates said. “We look much better than last year.”

NIU is his Paradise

NIU got its first recruit on Sept. 13 when Naperville Central High School combo guard Ryan Paradise verbally committed on his official campus visit.

A 6-foot-1 sharpshooter, Paradise averaged 19 points as a junior last season while connecting on 67 three-pointers. He had a career high of 38 points against Glenbard North.

“I chose NIU because I thought it was the perfect fit for me,” Paradise said. “I was really impressed with Coach Judson, [Mike] Shepherd, [Carl] Armato and [Donald] Whiteside and I thought that they would be able to help me a lot in the next few years. They are exactly the type of people I would like to be around for the next four years of my life.

“Also, I like Northern’s campus and the atmosphere. And the new Convocation Center is unbelievable.”

Thinking he can contribute early as well as being only 30 minutes away from home also were factors in his decision.

With one more scholarship opening, a possibility is Evanston combo guard Mike McKinney, who visited the DeKalb campus this past weekend.

At 6-foot-3, McKinney was an IHSA dunk contest finalist last year.

Displaying his dunking abilities, on his visit, McKinney, in casual clothes and boots dunked on a practice rim at the Convocation Center before a Huskie practice and shattered the backboard. No one but him and his mother were in the gym at the time.

Let the practices begin

While the Huskies didn’t kick off the beginning of practices with a Midnight Madness like many schools, they did begin practicing on Oct. 12.

Prior to practices starting, the team would wake at 6:30 a.m. to run miles and wind sprints at the track in between Douglas and Huskie Stadium.

It’s a new class

With four new faces who didn’t play last year, many fans were trying to figure out some of the new players Saturday.

With four freshmen and redshirt freshman Bryson McKenzie, there are plenty of fresh bodies.

The incoming freshmen are Sanders, a first-team all Chicago Public Leaguer, James Hughes, a 6-foot-10 Quad Cities native, Todd Peterson, a 6-foot-7 combo forward from Pekin and Anthony Maestranzi, a 5-foot-10 silver quick shooter from Bartlett.

“Rome did a good job at the end, James altered some shots and Bryson, this is really like his first year of really playing,” sophomore Julian McElroy said of the freshmen’s performances on Saturday.

Perhaps the biggest surprise on Saturday was Maestranzi.

“Anthony handled the press really well and set up the offense,” McElroy added. “Going up against senior and junior point guards, he really did well.”

A new home

While the Convocation Center was at about 1 percent of its 10,000 seat capacity on Saturday, the players got a good feel of what it is like to play there.

“It’s like actually playing D1,” McElroy said. “Chick Evans was nice, but it was like playing a [high school] super-sectional game. Here it’s nice open stands, a good atmosphere and a good place to play.”

New towel boy

In the second quarter of play, there was a wet spot underneath one of the baskets. Emerging from the player’s bench was a rather tall, athletic looking towel boy to help clean up the spill.

Make no mistake, this was not your regular towel boy, but last year’s 6-foot-4 sharp-shooter Al Sewasciuk.

Suffering nerve damage in his left foot four weeks ago while squatting in the weight room, he is slowly getting back into game form.

After the incident, he was on crutches for one week until feeling slowly began to come back. Currently, he is only doing non-contact drills during practice and taking the recovery process slow. He is expected to be back in time for the start of the season on Nov. 5 against Marathon AAU.