Northern Iowa

After leading Northern Iowa to the biggest win in school history, Coach Ben Jacobson is sticking with the Panthers. Northern Iowa and Jacobson have agreed to a new 10-year deal that includes a substantial pay raise, Athletic Director Troy Dannen announced Wednesday. The agreement will increase Jacobson's annual salary to $450,000 starting next season, with annual raises of $25,000 throughout the length of a deal that runs through 2020. Jacobson's old contract paid him $289,300 per year and ran through 2016.

Casey Martinez had a deal with Nebraska nearly a year before his football-playing son, Taylor, did. The father of Nebraska's starting quarterback owns the sports apparel company Corn Fed, and he entered into a licensing agreement with the university's athletic program about a year before his son committed to play football for the Cornhuskers. In June 2007, records show, Nebraska became the first of four universities to sign contracts with Corn Fed. The others were Iowa State (April 2008)

Maurice Newby hit a 3-pointer with one second left, and Northern Iowa shocked No. 11 Missouri 74-71 in today's first round of the NCAA tournament's Southeast Regional. Troy Muilenburg and Brad Hill provided the outside shooting, and Jason Reese added inside scoring and defensive rebounds as the 14th-seeded Panthers built a 12-point lead with 4:49 to play. But the Tigers, seeded No.

The Times' Chris Dufresne unveils his preseason college football top 25, one day (and team) at a time. No. 10 Iowa There are two games — one at the start, one near the end — that should scare the corn kernels off Iowa as the Hawkeyes plot a run for the Big Ten title and national championship. One involves a directional school and the other involves the defending Rose Bowl champion. Survive these obstacles and the Hawkeyes could be parading on Colorado Boulevard, or at the Glendale not near Pasadena — the one in Arizona, which is hosting this season's national title game on Jan. 10. The first possible season-wrecker is Iowa's home opener on Sept.

Northern Iowa University, playing without one of its top players, gave Pepperdine all it could handle Saturday at Malibu. "I tell you, we could never get rid of them," Pepperdine Coach Jim Harrick said after his Waves escaped with a 94-86 win before 1,022 fans at Firestone Fieldhouse. The Panthers, from Cedar Falls, Iowa, were playing without 6-10 center Scott Plondke, who was benched for missing a practice. Plondke is averaging 17 points and 8 rebounds.

Northern Iowa was embraced as the NCAA tournament's Cinderella after knocking out top-ranked Kansas. But it took just one look at Michigan State's bench to see which team was the real underdog. Spartans starting point guard Kalin Lucas wore his warmup clothes and a boot on his foot, using crutches to assist him on and off the court after tearing his Achilles' tendon in a second-round victory against Maryland.  Michigan State also played with two banged up starters in Delvon Roe and Chris Allen.

Eldon Miller, who will end a 10-year coaching career at Ohio State after this season, was named the new basketball coach at the University of Northern Iowa Thursday. Miller replaced Jim Berry, who has resigned effective at the end of the season. Northern Iowa's record this season is 8-17.Miller compiled a 170-116 record at Ohio State.

Earle Bruce, fired as Ohio State's football coach in November despite having won 75% of his games, has been named coach at Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls. Bruce, who has coached at Iowa State, said his ties in Iowa and with Eldon Miller, Northern Iowa basketball coach, brought him back to the state. "If this job were anywhere else but Iowa, I wouldn't be here," he said.

Most of his players never have been in a college game, his budget is limited and he's in a league that didn't exist four years ago. Yes, things have changed for Eldon Miller, who until he was fired from Ohio State last winter had coached one of the nation's most respected basketball programs in one of the nation's most prestigious conferences, the Big Ten. But Miller says he has everything he needs to make his new employer, the University of Northern Iowa, a winner.

It was the biggest upset so far in the men's NCAA Division I basketball tournament--a 14th-seeded team from an obscure conference beating a third-seeded team from among the nation's elite. A team with no NCAA tournament experience beating a team that ranked No. 1 in the nation before a late-season slump.

With his team trailing Northern Iowa at halftime Friday night, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo took a moment in the locker room to critique a couple of players, including Raymar Morgan. When it comes to criticizing Morgan, Izzo usually is second in line. "It's not coaches getting on him," Izzo said. "It's Raymar getting on Raymar." Izzo describes Morgan as a "rock" and says he is indisputably the Spartans' most consistent player. That wasn't always a term that could be applied to Morgan, a 6-foot-8 senior forward.

Northern Iowa was embraced as the NCAA tournament's Cinderella after knocking out top-ranked Kansas. But it took just one look at Michigan State's bench to see which team was the real underdog. Spartans starting point guard Kalin Lucas wore his warmup clothes and a boot on his foot, using crutches to assist him on and off the court after tearing his Achilles' tendon in a second-round victory against Maryland.  Michigan State also played with two banged up starters in Delvon Roe and Chris Allen.

Midwest Regional Baylor (27-7) vs. St. Mary's (28-5): Center Omar Samhan has dominated in St. Mary's two tournament victories, but he'll be facing a Baylor lineup that can include 7-foot Josh Lomers, 6-10 Ekpe Udoh and 6-10 Anthony Jones. St. Mary's has also received strong guard play from Mickey McConnell and Matt Dellavedova. Baylor's backcourt of Tweety Carter and LaceDarius Dunn is a good one, too, though the Bears have nearly as many turnovers as assists. Duke (31-5)

Ohio State has the luxury — or the burden — of being the only clear-cut favorite left in the Midwest Regional. The teams seeded No. 1, No. 3 and No. 4 are gone. "The team that survives is the team playing the best basketball," Ohio State guard Jon Diebler said. "There were some upsets in our bracket, but that's the tournament for you." The No. 2-seeded Buckeyes (29-7) face No. 6-seeded Tennessee (27-8) on Friday in a regional semifinal. The path was paved for the Buckeyes after top-seeded Kansas' surprising second-round loss to ninth-seeded Northern Iowa.

After leading Northern Iowa to the biggest win in school history, Coach Ben Jacobson is sticking with the Panthers. Northern Iowa and Jacobson have agreed to a new 10-year deal that includes a substantial pay raise, Athletic Director Troy Dannen announced Wednesday. The agreement will increase Jacobson's annual salary to $450,000 starting next season, with annual raises of $25,000 throughout the length of a deal that runs through 2020. Jacobson's old contract paid him $289,300 per year and ran through 2016.

Reporting from Cedar Falls, Iowa At the beginning of the season, as he has done every year at Northern Iowa, Coach Ben Jacobson hands his team a piece of paper and a pen, asks them to list their goals and leaves the room. The list this season's team came up with was lengthy. Jacobson makes a copy for each player who keeps it in his locker. "There's a lot of different things," senior guard Ali Farokhmanesh said. "We don't like to talk about it because it's the teams' goals."

The University of San Diego men's basketball team, which hasn't played at home in a month, returns to the Sports Center at 7:30 tonight to face Northern Iowa in a nonconference game. The Toreros last played at home on Nov. 30 and defeated Southwest Texas State. Since then, USD (6-4) has played six straight road games, winning three. Last weekend, USD finished third in the Longhorn tournament at Austin, Tex.

Cal State Fullerton committed 22 turnovers and lost to Northern Iowa, 71-57, before 812 at Titan Gym on Tuesday night. "The last eight or nine minutes, when they put a zone on us, that's what threw us out," said Winston Peterson, who led Fullerton (1-6) with 16 points and 11 rebounds. "We really don't know how to work a zone. Coach (Brad Holland) thinks we do, but we still aren't sure about it." The Titans are off to their worst start since 1980-81, when they also started 1-6.

Syracuse Coach Jim Boeheim says let this first nip-and-tuck weekend of the NCAA tournament be a lesson to us all. "The problem with college basketball is there's not a big gap," Boeheim explained Sunday of the relative talent levels of the majors and mid-majors. "Everyone wants to make it seem like it's a big gap. It's not a big gap." Wait an upper-state New York minute. Syracuse won its first two tournament games by 23 and 22 points — that's the Cumberland Gap. Boeheim must be talking about everybody else — his team looks unstoppable — but we're hip to his general point.

Saturday in the NCAA tournament was as uneasy as one ... two ... three. If you saw it coming you may have ties to Nostradamus but definitely not to Barack Obama, who is lobbying hard for bracket reform now that Kansas is not going to win the national title and Villanova is not going back to the Final Four. A guy from the L.A. Times made the same Oval Awful mistake and is paying for it by typing the words you are reading now for this emergency-access-the-NCAA carnage weekend (it couldn't, obviously, hold until Monday)