Illinois 72, Kansas State 64 Postgame

[skyIdub]

There's still time. I keep telling myself we've seen MSU crap the bed at the beginning of a season and end up in the Final Four, so why not us?

Not only this, but BU has shown his teams progress very well every year. Especially big runs at the end of the last two years.

As amazing as our '05 team was end to end....there's something very rewarding about watching a team battle through adversity to achieve great things. Sports drama.

 

[LostinNebraska]

We need to be pushing it off a miss every time, that's how we ran teams down and extended leads. Granted, we don't have an elite 6'5 guy who can finish, but pulling up in the half court and running 15 seconds off the clock and running a play is not our game. We are really lacking the confidence to be the aggressor in these games.

Right now the parts are greater than the sum. Kofi has been as advertised, but everyone else needs to find their place right now. Give me Curbelo, Hutch, Grand, Hawkins, Kofi to start without Frazier in the line up it seems.

I'd like to see more BBV than Payne right now.

Yes, we do. His name is Hutch.

 

[JFGsCoffeeMug]

We didn't look good, but we won.

Plummer shot lights out and we barely squeaked by, but we made it happen without Belo and Frazier for significant stretches.

And now we have 6 days to get the team reasonably healthy before our next real challenge.

Can't be too upset, all things considered.

 

[derrick6]

Now let's see the same Never Posters come in after a W and give BU and the bench credit for gutting that out without Frazier and a broken Curbelo?

I thought they played much better, coached much better.

Extremely happy to see Kofi make his free throws (didn’t notice he made them last game but he did), pass the ball out (for a couple assists?).

Damonte made a three.

Lot of good things happened to build on.

Hutch looks promising.

Way better product out there than the last two times.

 

[sunman]

Hutcherson provides a prescense at the two guard. Need that type of player who can drive or receive back cuts. Like seeing Curbelo, Hutch, Grandison, CH, and Kofi. Good 3 pt shooting, ball handling, mismatch set ups.

Do we only have one year with Hutcherson? I thought it was two?

 

[derrick6]

Glad to see Damonte finally knock down a three. If he's got his feet set, the shot still looks great.

And TWO ASSISTS FOR KOFI. Awesome.

One day the team will figure out Damonte is purely a set shooter and exploit it.

Never give him the shot on the move.

 

[EyeoftheIllini]

Just what the doctor ordered — a win. I disagree with some on here who are saying Illini needed to be pushing the ball more. I think BU purposely had this team take their time, relax and get into the offense. I think they’ve been a bit quick to shoot of late, which isn’t a great combination when not shooting well. Two previous losses, Illini shot 38% and 28%. They shot 52% last night. Sure Plummer getting hot had something to do with that, but excluding him the team still shot 47%.

And how about Plummer. Finally had a game like I saw him deliver in Pac 12. He won’t shoot like that every night, but I can guarantee you that won’t be his last hot night. And I thought one decision by BU went largely unnoticed last night. When Frazier and Curbelo were out, BU turned to others to bring ball up and start offense, leaving Plummer to play to his strength. Shooting is what he does. He’s not really that effective creating for others or for himself. He stayed out around the 3-point line and his teammates found him — even Kofi

I have to eat my words a bit regarding Kofi. In pregame thread I said Kofi didn’t have passing in his tool belt. It didn’t look very natural last night, but he made several passes out of the post. More impressive to me than the Plummer find were several times when he made the pass right away before the double team came, realizing he couldn’t make a quick move. He keeps doing that and both he and his teammates will benefit.

Finally, the other thing I liked that I thought went hand in hand with taking their time on offense was the straight up D they played. They didn’t get many steals or forced turnovers, but they held K-State to 39% and 29% shooting, and multiple times their defensive stops seemed to fuel the offense. All and all, it seemed like BU wanted this team to get back to basics — run the offense and play stout D (KSU shot only 9 FTs after opponents in previous two games shot 31 and 20). This team has shown it wasn’t ready to just pick up where they left off last year, so BU went back to establishing the foundation needed for winning basketball. Once they’ve shown the foundation has set then they can worry about pushing the ball and playing more like we’ve seen them play in past. But with Ayo gone, don’t be surprised if this year they never get back to playing like last year’s team. By that I don’t mean they can’t win like last year’s team, but they might just have to use a different road map.

 

[illinitiger]

We need to be pushing it off a miss every time, that's how we ran teams down and extended leads. Granted, we don't have an elite 6'5 guy who can finish, but pulling up in the half court and running 15 seconds off the clock and running a play is not our game. We are really lacking the confidence to be the aggressor in these games.

Right now the parts are greater than the sum. Kofi has been as advertised, but everyone else needs to find their place right now. Give me Curbelo, Hutch, Grand, Hawkins, Kofi to start without Frazier in the line up it seems.

I'd like to see more BBV than Payne right now.

Here's my thoughts on lineup for most control, good D and offensive success..
hutch, grandison, plummer with kofi and one of (prefer trent):

Trent, DMW, curbelo, hawkins

Grandison and Hutch are both potential playmakers and seem to take care of ball...plumer is 3p weapon.

Hawkins and curbelo have both showed signs of not protecting ball....if ball protection is not valued now.. it will continue to be a problem

 

[RML]

Us playing over the top of every screen for their guard gave him what? five layups? and what seemed like a ton of uncontested midrange jumpers. I know the midrange jumpers are the one shot you should be OK with giving up, but it made me uncomfortable. I was (pleasantly) surprised at hearing that their overall shooting percentage was lousy because I was a nervous Nellie throughout.
And I like BW's longer mane. I think it looks good on him, and him looking a little different made the game easier to watch.

 

[Seagee]

Us playing over the top of every screen for their guard gave him what? five layups? and what seemed like a ton of uncontested midrange jumpers. I know the midrange jumpers are the one shot you should be OK with giving up, but it made me uncomfortable. I was (pleasantly) surprised at hearing that their overall shooting percentage was lousy because I was a nervous Nellie throughout.
And I like BW's longer mane. I think it looks good on him, and him looking a little different made the game easier to watch.

Agreed on Weber’s more relaxed do, but I did almost get PTSD a few times hearing his foghorn voice yelling off-camera.

 

[LoveIlliniHoops]

I think it’s becoming obvious why our offense has struggled to start the season. TF and AC are more injured than advertised. BU doesn’t want the opponents to know the extent of the injuries, so they can’t game plan against us. If Pods can play clean enough not to turn the ball over and be a decent distributor, we might be better off than we’ve seen.

 

[illinitiger]

I think it’s becoming obvious why our offense has struggled to start the season. TF and AC are more injured than advertised. BU doesn’t want the opponents to know the extent of the injuries, so they can’t game plan against us. If Pods can play clean enough not to turn the ball over and be a decent distributor, we might be better off than we’ve seen.

I dont think TF was hurt until end of game yday. AC has been somewhat erratic since game 1....maybe compounded after injury.

Agree on just having someone there who can create flow and protect ball...maybe Podz is that guy.

Podz likely an upgraded outside shooter from AC.

 

[danielb927]

Belo could be dealing with post-concussion syndrome. I had a head knock back in 2014 and that part was much, much worse than the initial symptoms. I don’t remember whether “concussion protocol” was a thing back then, but now I’m curious if I would have passed it after a week or so. In my case the post-concussion symptoms started about 10 days in — mixed with some acute anxiety, so I’ll never know “for sure” what portion was concussion-related — but it was awful for at least a month (I left school and postponed a couple of finals) and took a full year to really feel “right” again. Robert’s post-game article is a great one. The way Curbelo looked last night, only being able to do things for short stints, under huge pressure to “tough it out” with no “real” (physical) injury, is 110% familiar to me.

 

[QCtoKC]

I dont think TF was hurt until end of game yday. AC has been somewhat erratic since game 1....maybe compounded after injury.

Agree on just having someone there who can create flow and protect ball...maybe Podz is that guy.

Podz likely an upgraded outside shooter from AC.

Umm...Frazier has been battling a shoulder issue literally all season and even missed a game. I think it has affected his shot. Of course, now there is great concern about his knee.

 

[IllinoisssssssVarsity]

Us playing over the top of every screen for their guard gave him what? five layups? and what seemed like a ton of uncontested midrange jumpers. I know the midrange jumpers are the one shot you should be OK with giving up, but it made me uncomfortable.

Generally you want to force contested mid range. Uncontested anything’s are bad. But it’s also possible they shot well above their mean.

Scouting reports are so advanced at the upper levels. They’ll know if he’s 50% at pull-ups going left and only 25% going right type thing, and have overall shot charts. My thought is if a dude gets in a groove in a way that’s above average for him, just make him miss 1-2 and he’ll regress to the mean.

 

[DeonThomas]

That win goes to Plummer and hutch. Hutch gained some confidence in this game, love to see it.

And yet…….he’s still REALLY lacking in confidence. Very tentative. Hesitant on all shots outside of 5 ft.

 

[Calvin]

Serious question: How bad is this team? Expectations were high, so it's hard to leave those at the door and go with what we've seen. I know the expectation is to make the dance, but from what you've seen, are we a tournament team?

I'm not all that surprised, simply because the past few seasons Underwood's teams have had some head-scratching losses and struggled to look well coached by the time conference play rolls around. To be fair, most teams do. Was hoping this year would be different. For sure there have been unusual circumstances, and I for one, fell for all the talk of quality depth, and how the returning players would steady the ship.

 

[Dan]

Injury speculation is off topic.

Requesting info on injury updates is off topic.

 

[illiniCA]

Just what the doctor ordered ...

I have to eat my words a bit regarding Kofi. In pregame thread I said Kofi didn’t have passing in his tool belt. It didn’t look very natural last night, but he made several passes out of the post. More impressive to me than the Plummer find were several times when he made the pass right away before the double team came, realizing he couldn’t make a quick move. He keeps doing that and both he and his teammates will benefit.
...

This exact same thing happened last year. Kofi didnt pass against MSU then he adjusted following that game. It would be nice to see him adjust during a game though.

 

[sully]

I'm very happy we won and King Kofi was outstanding last night as well. Here is hoping we continue to get it together and continue to win games Its a long season after all so I'm hoping for the best. GO ILLINI!

 

[EyeoftheIllini]

This exact same thing happened last year. Kofi didnt pass against MSU then he adjusted following that game. It would be nice to see him adjust during a game though.

Now the key is will he keep it up. I really don’t remember his adjustment being for much more than a game or so last year — though maybe I’m misremembering. Seems like yesterday’s game was the most he passed out of the post in one game since he’s been at Illinois.

 

[Pikeillinifan]

Kofi will keep it up, he knows what he needs to do to get to the next level.

I will enjoy him this year, but really looking forward to seeing what he can do in the NBA.

 

[Joel Goodson]

Have to mention Kofi's hands....so good tonight. Some of those balls came at him like Randy Johnson sliders.
He has clearly made strides as several have mentioned.

Second that. Can you imagine how many turnovers we'd have if Egwu was in there instead? The horrors.

Just to be clear, the problem isn't being caused by the receivers. And it's been a pretty huge problem so far.

 

[Calvin]

One day the team will figure out Damonte is purely a set shooter and exploit it.

Never give him the shot on the move.

I don't remember which game, but earlier this year he had an amazing made 3 on the move with the shot clock almost expired. I don't have a shot chart for him, but I think where he is on the court makes a difference.

 

[2qtslow]

Kofi will keep it up, he knows what he needs to do to get to the next level.

I will enjoy him this year, but really looking forward to seeing what he can do in the NBA.

I confess that I thought passing out of a double or triple team was somehow out of Kofi's skill set, given the number of times he has failed to do so over the past few years. I also thought his inability to do so was a major contributor to his low NBA draft stock.

Seeing him pass out for not one but two assists in one game is one of my brightest spots of the season so far, even if does pretty much guarantee we won't have him back next year because he goes in the first round.