Illinois 73, Northwestern 66 Postgame

[Manual3for4peat]

We have had 5 years of guys telling me williams doesn’t have to score to help the team. I thought hawkins was pretty good today.

Agreed. You can tell he’s fighting himself in confidence tho.

 

[molinefan]

It’s not the telegraphing of passes that’s the problem. It’s Kofi not passing out quickly enough. Also tonight Kofi was being hacked every single time he touched the ball. Refs wouldn’t call it because everyone would have been fouled out in the 1st half. Our offense is fine. The turnovers are what killed us tonight. 14+ the 2nd half. By absolutely everyone. That is what needs to be cleaned up. You make that 5 we win by 15+. A little bit of that was northwestern was hacking everyone and again the refs would have called a foul on every possession so they swallowed their whistles.

Glad to see that someone else noticed this. I felt for Kofi today. He's a big, tough guy but it has to be frustrating having 2 to 3 guying smacking you every time you get the ball without a whistle. This seemed to be the case much of the middle 20 minutes of the game. He seemed about as frustrated as I remember seeing him when he went out with a third foul.

 

[InDaAZ]

Best conference in the country? Have you watched the big 12 much? They got some teams.

Hmmm…
Kansas v Illinois
Baylor v Purdue
Texas Tech v Wisconsin
Texas v Mich St
TCU v Ohio St
Kansas St v Rutgers
Okla St v Michigan
Oklahoma v Iowa
W Va v Indiana
Iowa St v NW

Could be a case of familiarity bias, but I know how I’d bet a week of washing dishes…

As a matter of fact, for a month of mowing lawns, I might go:
SEC > Big-12
and if I was feeling really lucky, a week of litter boxes on:
Pac-12 > Big-12

 

[PassingBy]

 

[BretMyBeachHouse]

If not, they can get bounced by probably a dozen teams, and even more than that if that other team is hitting on all cylinders.

If we play like this in the tourney we would likely lose first round as a 3 or 4 seed

 

[Illini in Italy]

We had three starters that went 4 for 21 and we turned it over 20 times. A formula for losing if I ever saw it

Oh . . .and we didn’t lose. Just sayin’.

SMFH

 

[mikeyo]

View attachment 15328

I get it, but plus minus is the worst stat. You can literally do nothing and have a positive plus minus. You can also do everything and have a positive plus minus. I’m not even sure plus minus measured over time is useful

 

[ILLFAN67]

Guys banging on CoHawk, listen to BU’s press conference.

 

[Bebes_J]

This! So many turnovers against a mediocre defensive team are inexcusable. Our long stretches without scoring will haunt us in the tournament unless we can develop a more dynamic offense. If Curbelo wasn't such a turnover machine and Brad played RJ and even the other freshmen more we'd be better on offense- Podz subbing 10 minutes/game for Plummer or DMW, Goode and RJ subbing for Grandison. I don't see Hawkins giving us anything other than a few tip-ins and occasional good defensive sequence all year. Too many of our post feeds to Kofi are so telegraphed he's already swarmed before he even gets the ball and he really had trouble getting into his often awkward "gather" to shoot the ball if getting it more than 5 feet from the basket. An occasional pass fake after receiving it in the post and some actual quick passes to a perimeter shooter in the process of collapsing down or digging the ball from him would be nice and take give him more space to maneuver for his shot. We have to play much better to beat Rutgers at their place. Would like to see take more TO's to break up runs by the opposing team before it hits double digits.

TOs don’t stop runs. If they did no team would give up runs when in fact every team gives up runs. Momentum swings and runs are a part of sports.

 

[JimILL75]

Maybe the plus numbers today for Hawkins, RJ and Payne were because they were in together in some form and we then had a size advantage. Three of them and only 2 guards made a difference against the smaller NW team.

 

[Illini in Italy]

Our defense was sooooo good.
Our turnovers that led to easy buckets not so good
Williams 23 minutes and grandison 25 minutes are still too many
I don’t need to echo how good rj was
Curbelo is not anywhere near mid season form.
Kofi’s reactions are very slow
Win and led from start to finish
Alone in first place

Kofi saved ‘X’ plays with good hands on bad or deflected passes during the game, his reactions on the offensive end were well above par . . . .

 

[Bebes_J]

I’d love an Illini national championship as much as you. And hopefully it happens within both of our lifetimes. But I just looked it up, and it looks like only 25 schools have won a NC in my lifetime, so the fraternity is relatively small in that timeframe. Though I will admit the recent VA and Baylor NCs happening before Illinois getting one hurt.

As to the once in a generation comment, when was the last time a national championship team was led by a center? Illini certainly have weaknesses, if they’re hitting on all cylinders, they are a NC contender. If not, they can get bounced by probably a dozen teams, and even more than that if that other team is hitting on all cylinders. All that said, like you I’m loving where the program is right now. I don’t know if the Illini can go all the way this year, but will be fun finding out. And heck, if the other team I root for can make Elite Eight last year, Illini can win it all this year.

Go Illini.

If we get through the first weekend I’ll consider it a successful post season.

 

[Bebes_J]

Hmmm…
Kansas v Illinois
Baylor v Purdue
Texas Tech v Wisconsin
Texas v Mich St
TCU v Ohio St
Kansas St v Rutgers
Okla St v Michigan
Oklahoma v Iowa
W Va v Indiana
Iowa St v NW

Could be a case of familiarity bias, but I know how I’d bet a week of washing dishes…

As a matter of fact, for a month of mowing lawns, I might go:
SEC > Big-12
and if I was feeling really lucky, a week of litter boxes on:
Pac-12 > Big-12

All I know is I picked the big ten pretty heavy last year in my brackets and did lousy in my pools. This year I won’t repeat that mistake. I don’t see any big ten teams past the sweet 16.

 

[bootsy1974]

All I know is I picked the big ten pretty heavy last year in my brackets and did lousy in my pools. This year I won’t repeat that mistake. I don’t see any big ten teams past the sweet 16.

Yeah because what happened last year will definitely happen this year.

 

[ElGran]

If we get through the first weekend I’ll consider it a successful post season.

That's been my hope/expectation since the beginning of the season. Get to the round of 16. Of course anything beyond that would be fantastic.

 

[Bucktown]

No surprise how we lost to Loyola, NU tried many of the same things. Double/triple team Kofi and make him pass for a low percentage 3.

Also pressure the ball high and deny passes, which led to many steals.

We needed for Kofi to find the open player quickly. Open player needs to make the 3. Grandy was effective in pasding over defense for hi-lo feed to Kofi. Also not having Andre to dribble past the top of the key defense hurt.

Also need for players to cut towards the lane when Kofi is trapped. Dont make him pass across court wgen hus vack is to you.

Frazier was open 10 feet from Kofi.

 

[InDaAZ]

All I know is I picked the big ten pretty heavy last year in my brackets and did lousy in my pools. This year I won’t repeat that mistake. I don’t see any big ten teams past the sweet 16.

There definitely was a glut of upsets last year, but the bolded is… well, a bold statement.

 

[Arrow 7]

Hmmm…
Kansas v Illinois
Baylor v Purdue
Texas Tech v Wisconsin
Texas v Mich St
TCU v Ohio St
Kansas St v Rutgers
Okla St v Michigan
Oklahoma v Iowa
W Va v Indiana
Iowa St v NW

Could be a case of familiarity bias, but I know how I’d bet a week of washing dishes…

As a matter of fact, for a month of mowing lawns, I might go:
SEC > Big-12
and if I was feeling really lucky, a week of litter boxes on:
Pac-12 > Big-12

Thing is last year it was the best conference, and it didn't play itself out. So it just sortof carried on and off we go. It is way more fun to have them making fun of how bad we are and smokin them

 

[RabidDawgClassic]

Just finished watching the game. My watch read things correctly.

 

[rtbritt]

I'll say it, RJ will be our Keegan Murray. He's more wiry, but both are really smooth, athletic and totally unflappable. And I expect a similar jump from RJ next year.

I agree with your sentiment, for the most part. Keegan Murray was actually a rotational player for Iowa his freshman year; also, I think it is very unrealistic to expect RJ to jump like 15 ppg more than he scored this year.

Maybe you didn't actually mean what you said.

It is definitely fair to expect a nice jump from RJ.

 

[BillyBob1]

Just finished watching the game. My watch read things correctly.

Didn’t you know the outcome of the came already?

 

[Champaign88]

Take if two halves in many regards. In the first half I thought we really took care of the ball and moved it around well, leading to open shots that we converted at an above-average rate. We also really hit the boards well and kept Northwestern from getting good looks.

Second half we missed a lot of open looks, didn’t have the same defensive intensity nor the focus on rebounding and were careless with the basketball.

 

[Illini_1979]

Glad to see that someone else noticed this. I felt for Kofi today. He's a big, tough guy but it has to be frustrating having 2 to 3 guying smacking you every time you get the ball without a whistle. This seemed to be the case much of the middle 20 minutes of the game. He seemed about as frustrated as I remember seeing him when he went out with a third foul.

I'm going to give some love to Kofi too. Doubt we would have won without his 19/15. Of course, 6 TO is no bueno but I can't fault him too much for that as he was being hacked all game and the refs were letting it go.

 

[GForce]

I agree with your sentiment, for the most part. Keegan Murray was actually a rotational player for Iowa his freshman year; also, I think it is very unrealistic to expect RJ to jump like 15 ppg more than he scored this year.

Maybe you didn't actually mean what you said.

It is definitely fair to expect a nice jump from RJ.

Now that he's healthy, RJ has become a rotational player for us, on a team full of 4th and 5th year players. And he's in there at crunch time. He makes plays.
I know it's a lofty goal, but I stand by my prediction.

 

[trtl]

Great to get a win. However play like this in big ten tourney and more importantly the ncaa tourney and its an early ticket home. How an experienced and battle tested group can commit so many turnovers and look silly doing it is perplexing. Got to clean it up as tourneys are closing in.

Am I a bad fan if I don’t care how we do in the B1G tourney? I’d like to win conference (because I placed a bet when we were +700 to win it) but I’m not 100% certain going through the grinder of winning the B1G tourney is more beneficial than a little rest and preparation for teams we’ve not played before in advance of the real tourney. (duck and cover)