Illini Basketball 2025-2026

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#426      
illinifan1987
What about his rebranded Aunt Jemima?
jemima.jpg
 
#427      
OB positive
Second place is 1st loser said:
Yeah, with assistants, "some control" will not and cannot be confused with stepping on toes. It just won't happen. Everyone on staff has a purpose and they will have their own lanes.

Just because you bring in "a guy" that doesn't mean he's here to be "THE guy".

With all due respect to Crocker, he's still a young guy coming in from Colgate. He could have potential, he could be a nice recruiter and while he might have a seat at the table....there will be no overreach. Hamer game planning for Tennessee is > than Crocker game planning for Lehigh.
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It's not stepping on toes if the head coach gives you that particular assignment. Not saying that he has.
 
#429      
PepeSilvia
PleaseMakeABowlGame said:
how likely is petrovic average 6 or 7 assists this year
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Probably very unlikely. Only 19 players in the country averaged 6 assists or more per game.

Kasparis had the ball in his hands as much as anyone in the country and only averaged 4.7 assists per game. Now it will partially depend on how well other guys shoot on catch and shoot opportunities but I doubt Petrovic will be ball dominant enough to average that many.
 
#430      
Fly Illini Fly!
PleaseMakeABowlGame said:
how likely is petrovic average 6 or 7 assists this year
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PepeSilvia said:
Probably very unlikely. Only 19 players in the country averaged 6 assists or more per game.

Kasparis had the ball in his hands as much as anyone in the country and only averaged 4.7 assists per game. Now it will partially depend on how well other guys shoot on catch and shoot opportunities but I doubt Petrovic will be ball dominant enough to average that many.
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www.espn.com

Men's College Basketball Big Ten Stat Leaders, 2024-25 Season - ESPN

ESPN is the place for NCAAM college basketball stats! Discover the Big Ten stat leaders of the 2024-25 college basketball season.
www.espn.com www.espn.com

So here are the B10 leading assist-men last season. Only 3 of the top 15 will be back in the B10 next year - Smith (1st), Fears (3rd), and Thornton (8th).

Of course can't forget the high-impact lead guards transferring in as well - Donovan Dent, Elliot Cadeau.

Could Petrovic be in the mix? Certainly. Whether that's 5, 6, 7 .... tough to project. I think he's for sure gonna be IL in assists.
 
#435      
splitter
She doesn't look at all like my aunt Betty. And that doesn't look at all like my Uncle Oscar.
 
#439      
AnnaMay
Ga65 said:
Looks like this to me:
Front court rotation: Tomi, BigZ, and David
Back court: Andrej, Kylan, Mahailo, Ty, Jake

Spot minutes for the rest based on injuries, fouls and specific matchups. Think the specific lineups will depend on matchups and hot hands. BU seems to stick with a starting lineup but minutes vary greatly for all but the stars.

Have seen great flexibility in adapting offense to talent. Need to see the same flexibility in defense. Last year was greatly hampered by sickness in ability to practice as well as game minutes. That as well as the youth had to affect the resulting defensive schemes. However defense also slipped the previous year as the season progressed. Does our defense slip or does the oppositions scouting nullify it. Need the big buck guys to figure it out.
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If Im a betting man, I believe Hummer will get at least 15 minutes a game. Sometimes more. He is a 5th year senior that I would expect to play as much as Mirkovic unless Mirkovic is the next coming of Quincy Guerrier. Im sure what Im saying will pain many, but until proven otherwise, Ben is the better option. With that said, neither will start because I think Brad is planning on starting the twin towers at the 4 and 5.
 
#440      
Illini in Italy
AnnaMay said:
If Im a betting man, I believe Hummer will get at least 15 minutes a game. Sometimes more. He is a 5th year senior that I would expect to play as much as Mirkovic unless Mirkovic is the next coming of Quincy Guerrier. Im sure what Im saying will pain many, but until proven otherwise, Ben is the better option. With that said, neither will start because I think Brad is planning on starting the twin towers at the 4 and 5.
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#441      
the juiceman cometh
rmlsr said:
Hopefully the longer he works with the team defense Crocker gets more and more responsible regarding defense and eventually Hamer gets all his responsibility with the defense taken away.
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If Brad wants to give Crocker a role in the defense, or all the defensive responsibility, I assume that is because Crocker will be good at it. I fully support it, because I think BU has earned the trust, and the following is not aimed at a critique of Crocker at all. In fact, I am excited about the hire and by all accounts he seems to be a rising star.

It's just that, this reflexive, "oh good anyone is better than Hamer" stuff is pretty funny when you realize Crocker is coming to us from the #295 defensive team in the country this past season. Yes, that is a wholly different level of talent to work with, but still that's only good for the #7 defense in their conference (Patriot League) out of 10 teams.

The best proof we have that Crocker is good is that Brad likes him and thinks he will help us win. Funny enough, the reason Hamer still has a job also appears to be that Brad likes him and thinks he will help us win.
 
#442      
NarrowJ
Not to pile on with more of what will likely be perceived as "Hamer love", because honestly I'm pretty indifferent here, but his experience with the Lakers should not be poo-pooed as it has been often on here. He was not fetching coffee and washing jock straps as some have said in jest.

"Hamer arrived at Illinois in the summer of 2019 after spending the previous two seasons on staff with the Los Angeles Lakers. He was an advance scout in 2019 after debuting as a coaching associate in 2018. Hamer handled opponent scouting, with a focus on defensive game planning, and created video playbooks on all NBA teams."

That is a completely unaltered quote straight from his bio on the fightingillini.com website.

I strongly believe that Crocker will be nothing but helpful to us on the defensive side as well as with player development (and whatever else they will have him doing). Despite what looks to have been a fairly porous Colgate defense last year, he was on staff for the previous two seasons in which they won 26 & 25 games, respectively. At Stanford he served three seasons as director of player development, in which said timeframe they produced 4 NBA players.

Personally, love the hire as I was never of the opinion that we just absolutely needed another 'big name' assistant.
 
#443      
IlliniFan42
Based on what the media is saying, the Illini simply didn't have the money to go beyond Crocker. Expect Hamer to stay on at this time.
 
#445      
Epsilon
texillwek said:
It might be time for someone to create an Illini basketball imperialism map of Europe.
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As with the rise and fall of all empires, future generations of Illini can remember the glory days of when the empire was at its height and long for the days when its borders were larger.
 
#446      
Combo
AnnaMay said:
If Im a betting man, I believe Hummer will get at least 15 minutes a game. Sometimes more. He is a 5th year senior that I would expect to play as much as Mirkovic unless Mirkovic is the next coming of Quincy Guerrier. Im sure what Im saying will pain many, but until proven otherwise, Ben is the better option. With that said, neither will start because I think Brad is planning on starting the twin towers at the 4 and 5.
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Agreed. This is pretty much common sense. He may not start but he'll be in the rotation (unless like you said MIrkovic is an absolutely beast).
 
#448      
PepeSilvia
AnnaMay said:
If Im a betting man, I believe Hummer will get at least 15 minutes a game. Sometimes more. He is a 5th year senior that I would expect to play as much as Mirkovic unless Mirkovic is the next coming of Quincy Guerrier. Im sure what Im saying will pain many, but until proven otherwise, Ben is the better option. With that said, neither will start because I think Brad is planning on starting the twin towers at the 4 and 5.
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I'm not saying I disagree but Hummer is actually more experienced than you're giving him credit for.

He will be playing his 6th year of college basketball this year(and potentially has another year of eligibility). He played 3 years of NAIA ball at Huntington, 1 at Evansville, and 1 at Illinois.

Hopefully he can show us a bit of the hype about his shooting ability from last off-season. I'm not necessarily betting on it but it wouldn't surprise me if he took a big 2nd year jump as he's more comfortable in the offense and playing at this level(wouldn't surprise me to see him shoot 40+% from 3 operating on mostly open catch and shoot looks).
 
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