You realize that if being positive is speculating, so is being negative, right?
Illini Basketball 2018-2019
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You realize that if being positive is speculating, so is being negative, right?
Foggy Notion
- San Francisco
I never implied otherwise.
Boy, passing through three signing periods and being left with a roster with only two players taller than 6'6" is a pretty avant-garde way of fulfilling that plan.
I'm just curious, for everyone expressing certainty that we're on the right track, how much would those beliefs be affected by a really disastrous season, worse than last year?
Because for me, if there is really visible evidence that UnderwoodBall is bedding in, and we're a sharper, better executing team than we were last year, especially if coupled with a quality, roster-balancing class signed in the fall, I am going to feel very very differently.
Knowing Loyalty as I do, this is the piece that is likely doing virtually all the optimism heavy lifting. And not that it matters, but this talking point is no longer accurate. Both Richmond and Leonard were rated slightly higher.
Ayo no longer has Fifth Star Pixie Dust. Don't downgrade your opinion of him, take this opportunity to stop believing in that fairy tale altogether.
And if this is doing the heavy lifting....hey man, I am not a professional basketball coach, maybe I'm wrong, but this looks like 0-20 in the B1G to me. And that's even being very high on most of those players.
A true freshman wing and a flaky turnstile as your frontcourt? Hold onto your butts.
People don't seem to be engaging with the idea that we have a few very good players but an AWFUL roster right now.
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Illwinsagain
- Cary, IL
I have found you to be one of the more knowledgeable fans on this site. Losing Ebo hurts, or at least, does not help. I was thinking that this could be fun too! I hope we are right.
I'm a Red Sox fan, so I know all about Theo. I told every Cub fan relative and friend when they got Theo that the Cubs would win at a high level and sooner than later. However, you're missing sign posts, dude. Frazier, Da'Monte, Ayo, Tevian, Griff...young, long, athletic guards/wings. That's how you win at the college level. Did you get worried/upset when a young middle infielder like Castro was traded? Don't get worried/upset when we lose a project big like Ebo either.
If you're referring to my post, the only point I was trying to make is that these dark days will make it sooooo sweet once our Illini are back in the national spotlight.
Would you rather have 4 players like Ebo, or 1? The frontcourt is thin but it's not like we automatically have more value by having bodies that don't contribute much. Our roster isn't ideal right now but we have a ton of potential talent at the 1-4 on a small ball team. We are one or two proven front court players away from having a pretty good roster IMO. I always believed that it's a guard's game so as long as we have good guards, we'll always have a chance. I don't expect us too make that much noise this next year but if Kane shows his potential, I think we're in good shape heading into the next season.
Well Ebo is young, long, athletic big man who can run the floor. Maybe a bit of a project but one selected by the new guy running things. It isn't like Greg was someone else's recruit and Underwood didn't think he was a fit for his system. Ebo is a guy picked by BU. And it doesn't sound like BU was happy about him leaving.
This is where I'm at pretty much. Things will be interesting again if Khalil Whitney wants to come along for the ride. We'll see.
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I remember after the 87-88 season, we thought we were really going to be good with a 7 foot center and all the other players coming back. Jens Kujawa decided to go pro though and that made our front line thin. 6-7 Lowell Hamilton became our starting center and Ervin Small would be his backup at times. Lou decided later that it was the best thing that ever happened.
http://www.news-gazette.com/sports/illini-sports/mens-basketball/2011-03-19/ode-jens-kujawa.html
http://www.news-gazette.com/sports/illini-sports/mens-basketball/2011-03-19/ode-jens-kujawa.html
:frustrated:
So are you frustrated at the poster, the article, or yourself?
A bit harsh, but it certainly screams bottom of the B1G. It's going to be a bit of a repeat of this year - some excitement, some scoring, but an even more porous foul-prone defense that can't stop anybody in the paint.
Heh, heh.
The comparison is just ridiculous. He's trying to compare the FLYIN' ILLINI with where we are now.
AEX
- Danger Zone
I see a lot of people underselling Ebo. It doesn't change the fact that he's transferring, but let's not kid ourselves here just to feel better about the situation. His play last season was stellar given the fact that he was a freshman big and he had been playing basketball for such a short period of time. I would have loved to see a sophomore Ebo with a firm grasp of the system and a summer to hit the weights.
Let's look at his per 40 numbers in conference, and compare them to Egwu's per 40 in conference, as a lot of posters (myself included) have stated how much they'd love to have an Egwu on this team:
Ebo Frosh: FG% .551 // TRB 9.2 // Asst 1.0 // STL 1.4 // BLK 1.4 // Pts 8.2
Egwu Frosh: FG% .500 // TRB 5.6 // Asst .2 // STL 0.0 // BLK 1.9 // Pts 6.8
Egwu Soph: FG% .478 // TRB 7.7 // Asst .7 // STL 1.0 // BLK 2.2 // Pts 10.6
Egwu JR: FG% .391 // TRB 8.6 // Asst .7 // STL 0.4 // BLK 2.8 // Pts 8.7
Egwu SR: FG% .382 // TRB 8.0 // Asst 1.3 // STL 1.6 // BLK 2.3 // Pts 7.1
In conference play, Ebo had an ORtg of 116.6 and DRtg of 111.2, which is better than any combined rating that Egwu had. Would Ebo's per 40 numbers go down if given more minutes, perhaps. But Ebo played more minutes than Egwu did his freshman year and put up better numbers.
https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/greg-eboigbodin-1.html
https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/nnanna-egwu-1.html
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That's my prediction too, but that's because we're gonna add another big body or two from wherever we can find them and make do with that and Kane at center and try to cobble together some help for Kipper at the 4 too.
Kipper and Tevian as the two biggest guys on floor is just not a viable basketball lineup. Spare me your (the royal you, not you personally) blue hair anecdotes about talented, experienced true bigs playing a radically different style of play who just happened to be in the neighborhood of Kipper's height. Not applicable.
Posters here be like:
Just showing an example of small ball that worked. Not comparing this team to the flying Illini, but who knows? Just trying to be positive at this point.
Basketball dynamics have changed since then, but most importantly, there was a huge influx of talent back then that led to the 1989 team. Lowell Hamilton was a McD AA, so was Anderson, and Liberty. Extremely highly rated, and Illinois also added Kenny Battle arguably the best PF in Illinois history.
Same as with Lon Kruger's turnaround form 99-89 to 89-90. Illinois brought in 3 McD AAs in Frank Williams, Brian Cook, and Marcus Griffin (via JUCO) in addition to supplemental talent.
Height is not the issue, it is also the skillset for playing a position (Hamilton was undersized but had the skillset) and also pure talent level that can mask positional deficiencies. We have nowhere that level of talent coming in, not even in the same stratosphere. Yes, if we start landing multiple McD AAs all of a sudden in recruiting, the mood will chance around here, and it should.
The Flyin' Illini didn't work because the guys were small. It worked because the roster was stacked with the greatest collection of basketball talent we've had in the last 50 years. So much talent that the no. 1 high school recruit couldn't even crack the lineup.
We can be positive about the long term future of Illini basketball while being realistic that next year might be a disaster. We can also be positive about recruits like Ayo while acknowledging that he might not set the world on fire next year.
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Second/third this opinion. Ebo loss at this point really hurts us. He projected to be a solid B1G player. Much different than Matic who showed not one skill that translated as a freshman.
This is very true. But like, let's be real here. Take Hamilton, Liberty, Small and Battle off of that team and replace them with Doug Altenberger, Bruce Douglas, Frank Williams and Dee Brown. A per-player talent level just as good if not higher.
That team probably doesn't even make the tournament. They'd give up 110 a game in the circa-89 Big Ten, maybe more. The game of basketball cannot be played without guys that can guard post players and contest shots at the rim.
Basketball has developed a lot since then, to the point that "guys that can guard post players" no longer has to mean "guys that look like Luc Longley", but the fundamental skillset hasn't changed, and Kipper Nichols and Tevian Jones do not have it. Giorgi shows no signs of having it at this point. Kane shouldn't be expected to do it consistently without fouling for a couple years.
Ebo, by the end of last season, had that. His 25 minutes were going to be a massive difference-maker next season, just being a large object in the way of what the other team was trying to do. We have no obvious path to replacing that for next year's team, and if we can't MacGuyver it together, we'll struggle to get to 10 total wins EVEN IF the backcourt lives up to the hopes.
Basketball is a team game.
KrushCow31
Former Krush Cow
- Chicago, IL
I refuse to believe this is a normal transfer. If he didn't like Underwood, he would have left awhile ago imo. This is pretty late in the ball game.
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