CHICAGO — Chris Collins is only 51 years old, but he knows all about basketball's bluebloods and hanging banners and watching legends at work and play. Thirteen years into his head coaching career at Northwestern, none of that is lost on him.

History matters. So does winning.

He also understands full well what Indiana University basketball is all about, because he is — in a small way — a part of the Bob Knight coaching tree. He played for — and coached with — Mike Krzyzewski for 17 years, and the former Duke legend is the strongest branch in that Knight coaching tree. Collins has heard all the stories, too.

Watching him do his job on the United Center floor on Wednesday night also brought flashbacks for me from days gone by. Chris' father is Doug Collins, a Hall of Famer in his own right who coached Michael Jordan and the Bulls from 1986 to 1989. I remember when Doug got hired, and little 12-year-old Chris Collins was there to watch it all. It was a great time to be a kid. Those six Chicago Bulls championship banners might have all been won by Jordan with Phil Jackson as his coach, but Doug Collins set the stage. Chris watched and lived it all every day, a son very proud of his dad.

I paid attention even more to Chris a few years later, because he was a great player in his own right. He won Mr. Basketball in Illinois in 1992 and was a McDonald's All-American. He was heavily recruiting out of Glenbrook North High School, finally settling on Duke over many other bluebloods. He had a great career there, played two years of ball overseas, then came home to be a coach. He won two NCAA titles at Duke as a Krzyzewski assistant.

He did the impossible at Northwestern, taking them to their first NCAA Tournament in 2017. He's been back twice more, in 2023 and 2024, and is the only coach in Northwestern history to win an NCAA Tournament game. He has three, winning once each year.

And now, he has beaten Indiana seven straight times after pounding the Hoosiers 74-61 on Wednesday night in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament. He's beaten the Hoosiers twice in 16 days, and singlehandedly knocked the once-proud Hoosiers out of the NCAA Tournament.

Beating Indiana is a big deal. Beating them seven straight times is massive for a kid raised on history and banner-raising. 

"I'm just really proud of my team. This was a big win for us, beating Indiana,'' Collins said. "We felt all year long that, and even though you have to win to show it, we always felt like we're better than the record indicated. If you look at how we competed in this league, we haven't been able to get over the hump. We've lost a lot of close games, suffered a lot of self-inflicted wounds, breakdowns defensively in games we thought we'd won.

"I'm excited about the opportunity to keep playing. That was our whole goal. You want to keep playing. I thought our defense really stood the test in the second half against a team that's very difficult to defend.''

Northwestern beat Penn State in the first round Tuesday night, setting the stage for the meeting with Indiana. Collins knew its importance, and shared it with his players before the game.

This, he said, was one of those moments — and one of those opportunities — to cherish.

"We talked about it right before the game. I said to the guys, come on, guys, when you were little kids, we all love the game, all of us —coaches, players. Like when you were shooting in your driveway or you were in the park, you would always dream — I would use my imagination all the time,'' Collins said. "You would dream of playing in these kind of games, playing Indiana University in the United Center on national TV in the second round of the Big Ten Tournament. If you can't get juiced up and energy, then you should turn your jersey in, really.

"We just talked about taking advantage of an opportunity.  You don't want to waste when you get chances like this to compete against storied programs on big stages, NBA arenas, national TV type stuff. I knew our guys were excited. They're giving everything they've got. This is going to be a big tournament. ''

Outside of senior Nick Martinelli, who was terrific Wednesday with 28 points, the Wildcats are a young team. Many of the guys don't know any better. 

Martinelli does. 

I reminded Nick Martinelli about how he'd never lost to Indiana during his four years at Northwestern, and asked him if it gave him a bit more confidence that they could beat the Hoosiers again, even though it was still tight early in the second half.

"They're a great team,'' Martinelli said of Indiana. "You saw in the second half when it started to get chippy, they really cared. They really came in this game and wanted to win and fight. They're very well-coached.

"But when you come in the locker room and this could be your last 20 minutes with this jersey on and you know everything that — all the work that you've put in with these coaches and these players, you just can't let that slip, and we've let it slip too much this year. Hopefully we can continue to push. We obviously have an opportunity (Thursday against Purdue). I don't even know how we're going to be able to sleep tonight. We're so excited to get to play again.''

That pure joy is infectious. Collins feels it, too. It was a one-point game with 15 minutes to go, but then the Wildcats completely took over. Their defense was ferocious, allowing just five Indiana field goals the entire second half

"If we could just bottle up the second halves of both of the (Indiana) games, it would have been really good. They're very difficult to defend,'' Collins said. "Their movement and cutting and off-ball weak-side action, it's very difficult. It was fortunate for us we just played them (on Feb. 24 in Bloomington), so our guys had a familiarity with some of the movement and some of the things. We know how good (Lamar) Wilkerson is. We know what Tucker (DeVries) can do. Their guards' ability to drive the ball. (Sam) Alexis has been playing well of late.

"We struggled early. I thought they had a lot of points in the paint early. They were driving us. We had some miscommunications on some of our post doubles. They had some good schemes. They were getting us caught in some tough spots. Then the second half, we just talked about it, it was 37-36 at halftime. I thought we were playing very well offensively and so were they. We just talked about whatever team was going to buckle down and find a way to get stops in the second half would gain control of the game.''

It's a different deal at Northwestern, because Collins is never going attract five-star recruits there. But they make the most of what they've got, and a sure sign of Collins' greatness is that they've gotten better as the season's gone along. They were 2-13 in the Big Ten at one point, but have won five of seven since.

"To watch the young guys come of age, this was a big win. We knew it was going to be an NCAA Tournament type of game,'' Collins said. "We talked to the guys, and we knew what Indiana was playing for. We knew what their sense of urgency was going to be. We told our guys, let's approach this like it's a first round NCAA game because that's the kind of urgency they're going to have. I thought the game had that kind of intensity and really proud we were able to get a win.

"Indiana's team is super experienced. Tucker is a fifth year. Wilkerson's a senior. Dorn's old. Conerway is old. Enright's a fifth-year senior. We're playing against men out there. So for our guys to come of age and play the way they did, I was proud of them.''

What Collins loves most about this team was that they never hung their heads, even after tough losses. They just kept coming to work and getting better. That's why every game matters so much now. They just want to keep playing together, for however long as they can. 

"It feels great because a lot of teams would have shut down. We were 2-13 with a lot of just gut-wrenching losses, games that we had leads, big leads, games that we just let slip away,'' Collins said. "That wore on our team. For our guys to hang in there and since that stretch be able to win five of our last seven, and the two games we lost were a buzzer beater at Minnesota and a game against Purdue that came down to the last shot.

"So these last seven games, we've been playing our best basketball. Our guys are confident. They feel good. In these tournament settings, you can't think about the duration of the tournament. I told the guys, like you can't think about, oh, we've got to play this. You've got to play the game in front of you, and then you just figure it out.

"Like we were just in a war against Indiana. OK, now you've got to play Purdue. Well, thanks a lot. But you go back to the hotel, you figure it out, and we're fortunate that we got a chance to keep playing. I know our guys are confident, and they're excited about the opportunity.''

Freshman Jake West had 18 points, and he's part of a young core that reminds Collins of his first NCAA Tournament team. Young guys like Bryant McIntosh — an Indiana native — grew into stars and made history. So did Brooks Barnhizer, another kid from Indiana — on Northwestern's last two NCAA teams.

There's no quit, even after taking some lumps. Collins has seen this before.

"For these guys, I think at one point we were maybe 2-13 in the league, and you've got five games left. A lot of teams are looking for Cancun or wherever, Fort Lauderdale, whatever it may be, but these guys weren't like that,'' Collins said. "There's no quit in this group. They kept coming to practice every day. We kept preparing.

"I said all along we had a lot of young guys. It reminds me so much of my group with McIntosh and (Vic) Law and those guys, and we were 1-10 our first 11 games (in 2015), and we finished 5-2 in the last seven. It kind of set the stage for that group as they eventually made it to our first NCAA Tournament.''

During that 2017 season when Northwestern was making its first-ever NCAA Tournament and Collins was getting rave reviews for working a miracle, Tom Crean was on his last legs at Indiana. Despite winning Big Ten titles in 2013 and 2016, Indiana athletic director Fred Glass fired Crean after the 2017 season.

I had just moved back to Indiana from Florida and was writing my book "Missing Banners'' with my dear departed friend, Terry Hutchens. We talked about the firing — and potential hiring — that entire winter and spring.

We both liked Tom Crean, but understood recruiting had slipped and it might have been time for a change. I railed and railed — and pounded my desk often — that Indiana should hire Collins. I thought that much of him as a coach, and knew he could be even better at Indiana with all the resources. He could win like they won at Duke, and being the head coach at Indiana would have fit Collins perfectly.

A two-way street for sure.

But Glass opted for Archie Miller from Dayton, and that turned out to be a disaster. He was a mid-major coach and was in way over his head at Indiana. Collins at least knew what the Big Ten was like. He would have been terrific.

I firmly believed that then, and still believe it now. It was a big miss for the Indiana administration. Not as big as the current screw-up with not getting Michigan's Dusty May — a former Indiana student manager — but not far behind.

Indiana has stunk at basketball the past 10 years, making only two NCAA tournaments and never making it out of the first weekend. How much better would it all have been had Glass hired Collins then? We'll never know, but I don't think I was wrong at the time. Hiring Collins over Miller was a no-brainer to me.

Instead we've gone from Miller to Mike Woodson and now Darian DeVries, and all Collins has done is beat Indiana seven times in a row. He completely outcoached DeVries in the second half on Wednesday.

That's just what he does against Indiana. He gets to coach another game on Thursday while Indiana goes home with no postseason plans.

And they can give Chris Collins credit for all of that. His father Doug must be very proud.