Is this the Blackwell pivot? If I remember correctly, we were in on him last year for a bit.
Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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Just for fun, and knowing a few do not have rankings due to overseas recruiting, here are the 247 rankings (transfer rankings). Obviously a long ways to go with roster creation here but crazy how far this program has come in a few years. It stands out to me that player development seems strong. While the rankings are good, the output seems even better over the last few years. This is not a Duke ranked roster, but it competes with them.
Blackwell - 3-star (#2 transfer ‘26)
Coleman - #34 (‘26)
Andrej - #19 (‘23) (#32 transfer ‘25)
Mirk - #139 composite (‘25)
Tomi - #52 (‘24)
Vaaks - N/A (# 13 transfer ‘26)
Z - N/A (#41 transfer ‘25)
Jake - N/A (#379 transfer ‘24 lol)
Morillo - #59 (‘26)
Ty - #55 (‘22)
Lee - #99 (‘25)
I doubt it. Can't have him and Andrej on the floor at the same time. He would be a nice replacement if Andrej left, but he had a lot of issues last yr.
For a backup 4 that'a a floor spacer shooting threat, I'm really not sure that you could do better than Ben. And from what I gather that's probably even more true this year with bigs apparently being such a hot commodity.
For next year, this is the spot where I'm hoping Brad fills his annual quota of grabbing a Euro that we've never heard of that is at least playable and has multiple years of eligibility.
illiniswish09
- Northwest Suburbs
Desmond Claude portaling
I don’t think we’ll miss on both Vaaks and Blackwell.
But let’s say hypothetically we go 1/2 … this is who I think would be a great pivot:
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Definitely a better player prior to his time at Washington.
Rebounds and assists much better at Xavier and USC. He’s a dog if we lose Andrej.
3 point shooting is suspect. But Kylan and Andrej weren’t ideal.
Big Jack
- Decatur
Maybe growth plates still open
?
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madillini4
Ozamataz Buckshank
- Millywaukee
Illinicpa14
- Chicago
I wouldn’t be surprised if something to that extent is happening. We gotta be the only team with its same head coach that technically has nobody announced at returning…on a team that can very likely return a ton of pieces
Not really. They can console themselves with their 7-8 McDs AAs.
With how this year shock out for Keaton and Andrej (and KJ and Will last year), I can imagine the Illini sales pitch is a good one for freshman and transfers. You can come play your way into a starting roll over the summer, but if that doesn’t happen and you come off the bench, you can be just as effective or even more so. Having Will and Andrej flourish as the 6th man will hopefully continue to reap incredible benefits.
like I said, don’t sleep on Morillo. Kid could end up getting starting minutes. 6’7 point guard lol
Personally, I’m a bit surprised by the Vaaks + Blackwell idea. I’d go for a different pairing.
But I’m not on the staff whose putting together historic offenses here recently.
But I’m not on the staff whose putting together historic offenses here recently.
NASchamp
- Atlanta
Been wondering if that could possibly be the case due to the radio silence on that front. Could be legendary!
Wait until he has to play against 20, 21, 22 and 23 year olds(sad) who are all athletic. The amount of truly impact freshmen isn't great. Obviously, there are some, but to say he's "ready" to shine is a wing and a prayer.
Plus, with the portal, the truly good transfers are brought on with guarantees. Look at a guy like Keaton, who was an absolute unicorn. Probably won't see anything like it again. Think Boswell or Drej is here if they knew the ball would have been taken out of their hands? Drej literally could go to his 4th school, in 4 years despite coming off of a Final Four season and probably being in the top 5 to start the year if he comes back. We are holding our breaths, while all of those guys know that losing just one really, really will hurt badly.
I would really, really be cautious in thinking this is anywhere near a lock. You've been around long enough to know that things can and more often do go sideways. When talking about money, it's amazing how programs come up with additional out of nowhere.
There are more than a few people in this thread who don't seem to be sold on Vaaks.
A real bunch of anti-Vaaksers, they are.
A real bunch of anti-Vaaksers, they are.
After last night, I'd pencil Morillo in for some solid minutes
For God's sake bring me a couple of junkyard dawgs!!! Maybe a goon!!! An enforcer!!! It might not look ELITE but I hate not having a solution... ILL
So:
We scored 1.249 points per possession. We had 65.7 possessions per 40 minutes.
So, we scored 82.0593 points per 40 minutes.
We played 37 games this season.
82.0593 * 37 = about 3,036.194 points scored total IF each game were 40 minutes.
But, each game was not 40 minutes. We played 4 overtime games this year (MSU, UCLA, Wisconsin, Wisconsin) which means we played:
(40 * 37) + 20 =1,500 played minutes on the season.
IF each game were 40 minutes, we would have played 1480 minutes.
So:
(3,036.194 / 1480) * 1500 = 3077.2236 (rounded to 4 decimal places)
3077.2236 / 37 =
On the season, Illinois is listed to have scored this many points per game:
So there’s the super complicated method of finding out points per game.
Yes, you could obviously use total points scored divided by total games played for a significantly simpler calculation - and by definition, a more correct result (or the same result).
However, this was me just trying to prove that pace and ppp are the actual data that matters.
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Oh my head!!! INI!!!
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