Chuck Nuggets
Dip your nuggets in my staff source sauce.
My theory is he's hurt, not 100%, and he's very frustrated.
Illinois 88, Purdue 82 Postgame
- Status
I've seen a bunch of people bringing this up about Painter, however I think he knew something that people are overlooking and it's that he didn't have confidence that his players could guard us. I think he knew that he didn't have the guys who could guard against us getting wide open threes. And that’s precisely what happened whenever they helped defend Keaton. I believe Painter's scout going in was they could live with Keaton's jab step 3 but they couldn't give up wide open threes to Jake, Ben, and the Ivisic bros, while still wanting to collapse an Andrej when he drives.
But with Keaton draining those threes, Painter knew he had no good options. And I think that really showed in the final 5 minutes. If Painter had strong physical guards available I think he would have gone that route. But without that he knew his team was going to give up wide open three after wide open three with Cluff, TKR, and Loyer. I think the only real other option Painter had was to just leave Andrej or Mirk uncovered and force them to beat you instead
I think that’s an insane perspective. It’s just a situation where you won the game, so you can attest it to pretty much whatever. Say Smith goes to the line, makes all three, and we give up a 3pt at the buzzer to force OT. Yes, worst case scenario, but that Andrej foul would’ve been looked at as the dumbest play of the entire season.
4pt lead, 10sec remaining… fouling a 3pt shooter is THE BIGGEST no no in that scenario. I’m sure every coach will tell you that. It both stops the clock AND gives up free points.
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In wondering about those last possessions, I forgot that Andrej was one of our five out there. Replace him with BAM, and it still spaces the same, and Mirk, Big T and Jake still get their threes.
And that makes me ponder: when BAM comes back, might he take Andrej's spot, not Jake's?
Yeh, I forgot that Andrej was one of the five. In that spot, I would have happily had BAM in there rather than Andrej.
OrangeBlue98
Iowa is not in a great spot right now (LvilleILL1)
- Des Moines, IA
Thanks. That’s what I did mean. Coffee hadn’t kicked in yet.
I really like to hear Painter break down a game. He said Wagler’s game probably was the best he’d seen against his team at Mackey. But he said the reason they lost was giving up 13 offensive rebounds.
He explained how the shooting ability of the Illini big men forced his defense to become inverted and the result was his guards getting stuck under the basket where the Illini’s overall size was an advantage. Said he tried to get his big men to stop boxing out 18 feet from the basket and just sprint to the rim when shots went up.
He essentially said whatever they tried on defense, Wagler and Co. had an answer.
He explained how the shooting ability of the Illini big men forced his defense to become inverted and the result was his guards getting stuck under the basket where the Illini’s overall size was an advantage. Said he tried to get his big men to stop boxing out 18 feet from the basket and just sprint to the rim when shots went up.
He essentially said whatever they tried on defense, Wagler and Co. had an answer.
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I'm not a fan of Braden Smith but kudos to him because he actually gave good answers to questions. TKR just came across as a punk with no insight into anything.
Or you let Smith hit the 3? I would rather see him go to the line and take a risk. Andre at 6'7 vs a 6 foot gaurd. Go for the block. Risky either way....a block could have sealed it then and no one would be calling it a bad play.
Mentally
Illinois has also eviscerated presses this season. Just ask Missouri.
It's significantly more likely Smith makes 3 FTs than a contested 3 over length.
I'd still prefer giving up the 3 than fouling. The clock doesn't stop.
Obviously I'd prefer hindsight knowing he missed (but we were very fortunate).
True on point one, but you are taking a game ending risk with a block. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.
I’m just happy it wasn’t one of those half-hearted block attempts that end up being a 4-point play when Smith shoots, kicks his leg out and falls.
"much rather live with a contest" is how a coach would preach it. the fan side is obviously tbd.
Captain 14
- The Last Best Place
My Purdue friend told me last Friday we were getting them at a good time..."Smith and TKR are playing hurt and Loyer can't get his head out of his !!!."
Hmmm...you can't say !!! on here?
Hmmm...you can't say !!! on here?
lstewart53x3
- Scottsdale, Arizona
This team can make a run because of the number of ways the offense can hurt you.
Loyola took the 21 team out of what they wanted to do and it was game.
That isn’t going to happen this year.
Bigtex
- DFW
Agree
Illinois has option 1A (wagler)
1B (andrej)
1C (Tomi)
1D (Mirk)
1E (Davis)
1F (bench and healthy Boswell)
IMHO, Painter switched his defense at the worst possible time. Wagler was gassed. I would have continued to make him shoot the tough shots while tired that he had been making in the game. Pinter's original thought that his team couldn't get caught up being in rotation was probably right.
I watched the press conference with TKR. They didn't even need him at the presser. The other thing I noticed that Loyer is not the same as he used to be to be with his shot. He use to be almost automatic from three. I understand it is difficult for the student athlete to give details after a tough loss especially at home where they rarely lose.
Just wanted to follow up because I’ve seen a lot of the commentariat criticize Purdue’s defensive game plan. I actually don’t think it was awful. I’m sure Painter saw mismatches all over the court and that if they played drop coverage they would get killed with Keaton middies/layups or 3s from our stretch bigs. So they decided to lean on Mackie and switch everything and put it all on the kid assuming Mackie would rattle him. Because Mackie rattles just about everybody, including our 4 other starters (think everyone else settled in after about the first ten minutes except for Andrej, who remained rattled throughout). There’s just no way to know an 18/19 year old kid would be that unphased on that environment. I know it’s been said but just a truly remarkable performance.
And I also wanted to discuss the idea that we got lucky. Of course no way we could have expected Keaton to go 9-11 so in that sense we were lucky. But I think anyone who has watched us for any amount of time this year would say if the game plan is to switch a plodding big onto Keaton at the top of the key, he’s going to get alot of in rhythm 3s and probably make a fair amount.
Now contrast Purdues defensive game plan with our defensive game plan, which appeared to be to mostly limit their 3 point attempts and force Smith and TKR to beat us with tough, contested 2s. Our plan mostly worked, and in fact the few possessions we went to zone was when Mayer burned us with 3s. But Smith and TKR shot 69% an 75% respectively, with Smith mostly making extremely difficult fallaway 2s and TKR hitting his patented 12 foot push shots (think about the shooters bounce he got on the 2 he hit in the last ~ 3 minutes, we would have rued those bounces if we had lost).
Keaton certainly hit some tough ones, but I bet the analytics would say Keaton’s shots were much better than Smith or TKR’s. So if we got lucky with Keaton’s performance, Purdue got just as lucky if not luckier with all of the shots Smith and TKR made.
And to me our game shows Purdue actually has a pretty slim margin for error against elite teams. If they don’t get superstar performances they can get beat. I think we have many more ways to win than Purdue. When we have Kylan, I think our defense is better. We have better rim protection with Z and Tomi. We can matchup hunt. We can score via offensive rebounds and free throws. Just a lot of ways we can win a game which makes me super excited for March!
And I also wanted to discuss the idea that we got lucky. Of course no way we could have expected Keaton to go 9-11 so in that sense we were lucky. But I think anyone who has watched us for any amount of time this year would say if the game plan is to switch a plodding big onto Keaton at the top of the key, he’s going to get alot of in rhythm 3s and probably make a fair amount.
Now contrast Purdues defensive game plan with our defensive game plan, which appeared to be to mostly limit their 3 point attempts and force Smith and TKR to beat us with tough, contested 2s. Our plan mostly worked, and in fact the few possessions we went to zone was when Mayer burned us with 3s. But Smith and TKR shot 69% an 75% respectively, with Smith mostly making extremely difficult fallaway 2s and TKR hitting his patented 12 foot push shots (think about the shooters bounce he got on the 2 he hit in the last ~ 3 minutes, we would have rued those bounces if we had lost).
Keaton certainly hit some tough ones, but I bet the analytics would say Keaton’s shots were much better than Smith or TKR’s. So if we got lucky with Keaton’s performance, Purdue got just as lucky if not luckier with all of the shots Smith and TKR made.
And to me our game shows Purdue actually has a pretty slim margin for error against elite teams. If they don’t get superstar performances they can get beat. I think we have many more ways to win than Purdue. When we have Kylan, I think our defense is better. We have better rim protection with Z and Tomi. We can matchup hunt. We can score via offensive rebounds and free throws. Just a lot of ways we can win a game which makes me super excited for March!
and he's better at making decisions when driving with a quick layup or a kick out. he's made a few clutch layups for us this year already. on the other hand, we might not have had Davis play as much if Boswell and Stojakovic are both available.- Status