MASON CITY – The NIACC men’s and women’s basketball teams have gained a new ICCAC opponent.
According to a story in the Council Bluffs Daily Nonpariel Wednesday, Iowa Western will join the ICCAC Division II league in men’s basketball in the 2020-21 season and the Reiver women will join in the 2021-22 campaign.
The ICCAC Division II men’s league will increase to nine teams and each team will play 16 league games. The ICCAC Division II women’s league moves to 10 teams and 18 conference games in the 2021-22 season.
On Tuesday, the NJCAA Board of Regents Appeal Committee voted unanimously to grant Iowa Western’s request to move both programs to Division II, according to the Nonpariel story.
According to the story, Iowa Western President and interim Athletic Director Dr. Dan Kinney said the administration has been discussing the move to Division II for more than a year.
“It’s something we’ve thought about for a long time. One of the things that we want in our basketball programs is to recruit more local students, and that hasn’t been the case in the past, so that was one of the reasons we moved to Division II,” Kinney said in the article. “There’s a lot of competition in Iowa. Most of the community colleges are Division II in men’s and women’s basketball. That provides us with a lot fuller schedule with some really good competition. I think we’re going to have a lot more local athletes on those two teams, and that’s important to us.”
The NIACC men topped Iowa Western 100-88 at home in a non-league game in the 2019-20 season. NIACC leads the all-time series against Iowa Western 20-10.
The NIACC and Iowa Western men have played non-league games against each other every year since the 2016-17 season. Iowa Western has won three of the last four meetings against the Trojans.
The Iowa Western men were 16-15 overall and 4-4 in the ICCAC Division I league in 2019-20.
The NIACC women topped Iowa Western 89-63 in a non-league game in the 2019-20 season.
The two teams have played each other in non-conference games every season dating back to the 2011-12 season. Iowa Western has won eight of the last 10 matchups against the NIACC women.
The Iowa Western women were 19-11 overall and 3-1 in the ICCAC Division I league in 2019-20.
