THIS REALITY MUST be fixed!I don't think most of America cares enough to judge us.
For fun, here is our Big Ten/ACC Challenge history:
We have had a couple of streaks, but overall, we are 8-12 (.400). We peaked at 7-7 (.500) after that George Tech win in 2012-13, at the time the best record among Big Ten teams (IIRC). I would say it's time we start winning some games and getting those fun matchups again, starting with BEATING MIAMI! Here are all of the opponents we've had:
Maryland (x4)
North Carolina (x4)
Clemson (x2)
Duke (x2)
Georgia Tech (x2)
Miami (FL) [x2] ... counting this year
Notre Dame (x2)
Wake Forest (x2)
NC State (x1)
This is a must-win, plain and simple.
Lose and season's over?
Dakich, as many of you hate, has grown on over the years.I see we are getting so many poster's arch-nemesis, Dakich, to announce.
Of course not, but Miami is unlikely to be a tourney team. Lose games like this and we are putting ourselves behind the 8 ball.Lose and season's over?
Need to win at home.As it stands now, our first 2 conference games are against #3 and #4 in the country. These next 3 are huge.
Dakich, as many of you hate, has grown on over the years.
Illini by 10.
Georgi leads us in scoring
A doctor can take care of that with a little dry ice.Dakich, as many of you hate, has grown on over the years.
Yep. We're going to have to do some significant work to even hit .500 in the conference this year due to getting the bad end of an unbalanced schedule. We could easily be underdogs in the first five conference games we play.Cute. But you know what I mean - there is shaping up to be very little margin for error on our schedule, so we need to be beating middling P5 teams at home if we want to dance.
Here's the full game from 1999:Wow, what a run we had in the early 2000's. Noting where we were ranked entering this challenge.
In consecutive years, from 1999-2005.
#16
#9
#2
#25
#11
#5
#12
2005-06: #12 Illinois 68, North Carolina 64 in Chapel Hill, NC
2004-05: #5 Illinois 91, #1 Wake Forest 73 in Champaign, IL
2003-04: #10 North Carolina 88, #11 Illinois 81 in Greensboro, NC
2002-03: #25 Illinois 92, #12 North Carolina 65 in Champaign, IL
2001-02: #5 Maryland 76, #2 Illinois 63 in College Park, MD
2000-01: #1 Duke 78, #9 Illinois 77 in Greensboro, NC
1999-00: #17 Duke 72, #16 Illinois 69 in Chicago, IL
Liked, so that it could be immediately un-liked.79-71 Miami
Jesus, I would love to see it.For what it's worth, Oddshark has it as an absolute beatdown
https://www.oddsshark.com/ncaab/miami-illinois-odds-december-2-2019-1189175