The Big Sky basketball blog is back!

Jonathan Reed did a fantastic job blogging about Big Sky Conference basketball for years. It was always clear Jon loved basketball, watched games and paid attention.

When he decided to step away after last season, though, following Big Sky hoops wasn’t the same. Bigskybball.com was always a great place to check out for coverage of the entire league, and Jon cranked out quality material week after week to keep us coming back.

Luckily, Jon has been kind enough to let me step in for the next month or so to write about the Big Sky as teams battle for postseason positioning in the conference’s first postseason tournament at a neutral site (less than a month away*).

It’s been a sensational season so far. Weber State’s Joel Bolomboy is an NBA-draft prospect, the Wildcats and Montana have established themselves as the frontrunners (nothing new there), Eastern Washington is the hottest team in the league and then we’ve got fourth-place Idaho State … what the heck are the Bengals doing two games above .500 in the middle of February (three words: hello, Ethan Telfair)?

What exactly can you expect on bigskybball.com while Jon has left me in charge?

— Come here for links to coverage from across the Big Sky. There are a number of beat writers doing awesome work you should check out.

— I love rankings. Really, I love ‘em. I’m going to rank the Big Sky 1-12 every Tuesday, and I’ve got a couple other lists I’m excited to put together in the next month or so.

— On Thursdays and Saturdays, I’ll have a short preview of each game that night, plus links to the local news coverage, video and audio streams.

— And then just other stuff … we’ll figure it out as we go.

Let’s have some fun.

Kyle Franko

*obligatory #RoadtoReno

Happy to announce that @ByKyleFranko will be taking over at https://t.co/Whs19iucIm for the rest of the season! #BigSkyMBB

— Jonathan Reed (@bigskybball) February 15, 2016

Kyle is a former Idaho State beat writer who is overqualified and will be fun to read the rest of the way. He is very knowledgeable.

— Jonathan Reed (@bigskybball) February 15, 2016

My wife & I have been traveling the world, so it will be great to have the Big Sky blog going again, in even more capable hands than before!

— Jonathan Reed (@bigskybball) February 15, 2016