Horizon League Basketball: Preseason power rankings for 2021-22 season

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - MARCH 09: The Cleveland State Vikings celebrate winning the Horizon League Men's basketball championship after defeating the Oakland Golden Grizzlies at Indiana Farmers Coliseum on March 09, 2021 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Justin Casterline/Getty Images) /

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Horizon League Basketball Northern Kentucky Norse Illinois Chicago Flames 54 /

9. UIC Flames

2020-21 season record: 9-13 (6-10 in Horizon)

Key losses – Teyvion Kirk (14.2 ppg, 6.8 rpg, 5.6 apg), Braelen Bridges (9.9 ppg and 4.8 rpg)

The trajectory of the Flames went crashing down at the end of last season, losing nine of their final 10 games. That and the loss of their clear best player Teyvion Kirk and the frontcourt duo of Brealen Bridges and Rob Howard leaves some questions about the ceiling of the roster coming into the season.

Illinois-Chicago certainly won’t have any experience issues, as the entire roster consists of all but three upperclassmen players. That includes forward Michael Diggins, who was the only player to play and start all 22 games last season and averaged 10.8 ppg and 5.9 rpg. Joining him is a pair of frontcourt transfers in 6’11 big Marcus Larsson (8.3 ppg and 7.1 rpg at Incarnate Word), and Brandon Battle (11.6 ppg and 7.7 rpg at Alabama State).

Replacing Kirk won’t be done by one guy but look for Maurice Commander to have a sizeable role. The 6’0 guard was limited to just 12 games but did average 10.5 ppg and 2.3 apg, while shooting an impressive 43% from three-point range and 85% from the charity stripe. 6’5 wing Jamie Ahale is also back for a 5th year after scoring 6.7 ppg on 34% from deep on over six attempts a game. Rayquawndis Mitchell (8.3 ppg) is also back.

There’s plenty of depth in the backcourt for UIC, thanks to several transfers that were impact players at their previous stops. Jalen Warren averaged 12.3 ppg at Florida Gulf Coast, Damaria Franklin produced 13.3 ppg at Tennessee Tech, while Kevin Johnson was an All-Southland performer and double-digit scorer from Nicholls State.

The concern I have with this roster is two-fold. One, there are lots of players that averaged between 10-12 ppg at here or their previous schools but no one has shown to be that leading scorer on paper. Can someone break out? Sure. But that’s yet to be seen. And while it may be unfair to view it this way, many of the transfers joining the Flames came from schools at the lower-tier mid-major level such as the SWAC, Southland, and ASUN. The Horizon League is a fairly big jump from there and it may be too big for some of these players.

Yet if they collectively can come together and score enough, UIC may have a roster and the depth that ends up being more than the sum of its parts.