The chances of US seeing that potential realized is slim in this new day and age. SOMEONE will, but maybe not us.
Illini Basketball 2025-2026
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ptgrd23
- orange county CA
very similar style. Low release on 3 pointer, Plays on ground in lane, shifty, uses his height. Not super athletic but smooth with good size. Gatorade says he grew 2 inches to 6'6". Prep hoops says 6'7". Hopefully he keeps growing until he is 6'10" the next Kevin Durant!
Homecoming 2019
- Chicago
Always interesting to see how these guys adjust to playing without the ball in their hands 24/7 like they do in highschool.
ptgrd23
- orange county CA
I think Andrej is NBA bound at end of season. If Keaton shows same improvement as Will he could be starter for us in 2026-27 a SF or 2G.
Downside of getting OLD is we will be losing a lot if not most of our team to graduation.
Need a blend of HS recruits who stay - hopefully Keaton and Brandon fall into that category. I
Downside of getting OLD is we will be losing a lot if not most of our team to graduation.
Need a blend of HS recruits who stay - hopefully Keaton and Brandon fall into that category. I
I think there's a good chance we have a very nice core back again next year. Andrej/Tomi are guys that I would say could be here for multiple years. Illinois will pay up if they have second round grades.
ptgrd23
- orange county CA
I hope you are correct. I did not expect both KJ and Will to go to NBA. I did not expect Morez to transfer. Tre going to 4 schools in 4 years I should have expected.
Its easy to say avoid players with multiple transfers but then we would have passed on Andrej (3rd school in 3 years) and Big Z (3rd school in 3 years) so what do I know?
With exception of Purdue and MSU nobody seems able to keep even 60% of their core intact. Hopefully college goes back to normal and if you are a starter you stay at your school
. Others schools holding onto their starters were Houston, Auburn, and Iowa State. Then again they recruit for killer defense so maybe different type of player.Of course we see same problem on resumes of Gen Z employees at my company- 4 companies in 4 years so maybe it is not just the portal/$NIL but rather something with this generation.
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Torvik has Illinois at #8 in his preseason top 25 projections. Unclear if Mirkovic and Petrovic are factored in but with a #8 ranking I assume they are.
It does not include either
https://www.barttorvik.com/rostercast.php?team=Illinois&year=2026 shows the data. good luck making heads or tails of it
I feel like this was primarily an Illini fan problem because outside our fanbase KJ has been a draft lock since preseason and Will Riley has at least been on the radar just not always mocked first round. It's funny, the only people in the world that thought KJ couldn't be drafted were Illini fans.
Have you ever used the waybackmachine? --> web.archive.org
Here's the NBADraft.net mock prior to the season beginning: https://web.archive.org/web/20241111202211/https://www.nbadraft.net/nba-mock-drafts/
No KJ or Riley anywhere to be found
Here's the NBADraftRoom.com mock prior to the season beginning: https://web.archive.org/web/20240720182834/https://nbadraftroom.com/2025-nba-mock-draft/
No KJ or Riley anywhere to be found there either
Their slow-but-sure vault up the draft mocks this season is a huge, huge sell for recruits & xfers
Maybe NBA Draft Reddit is just brighter than those folks because I'm looking at posts from months ago where they call KJ a lottery pick and he was mocked there pretty early. If anything he's fallen a bit in terms of the mock drafts I've seen on the sub.
Will Riley is more all over the place.
Legacy media is admittedly slower than Reddit to come around on these guys because they've got two things working against them: they're international and they're Illini. And that's hell for lazy journalists.
Post from nine months ago for example - https://www.reddit.com/r/NBA_Draft/comments/1edjelb/2025_lottery_pg_prospect_kasparas_jakucionis_is/
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One obscure reddit post with 3 total replies doesn't exactly form a mainstream opinion
Both players rose dramatically in mocks & overall public opinion over the course of the season, and that's not really arguable in the slightest
Editing just to say maybe you are right and the guy who wrote that is just smarter than everyone else, but it certainly wasn't the mainstream take at the time
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Was he really though? Because I remember Traore and Gonzalez being way more highly regarded Euro guys that stayed there and Demin was a bigger name coming over.
When his name first came up he was being touted as a 2 year guy
I don't necessarily think anybody thought he couldn't be drafted but I think a lot of people thought it might only be one or the other regarding Riley or Kasparis as that if both were getting picked in the 1st round them we would've had a better season.
I added Will Riley and we went to #5....
This is right at the end of preseason, a mainstream article (Bleacher Report) linked to in the sub from October has KJ 8 and Will Riley 24.
2025 NBA Mock Draft: Full 2-Round Predictions and Pro Comparisons
NBA scouts have already begun working a 2025 draft cycle that's expected to produce a class with multiple star prospects. Duke's Cooper Flagg has been…
syndication.bleacherreport.com
A month later and KJ fell mightily while Will moved up a tad.
2025 NBA Mock Draft: Full 2-Round Predictions and Pro Comps After 1 Month
The preseason hype over the 2025 NBA draft class remains high after a few weeks of college basketball. Some of the projected one-and-done first-rounders look…
syndication.bleacherreport.com
KJ then blasted up and Riley fell out
2025 NBA Mock Draft: Full 2-Round Predictions and Pro Comparisons
Duke's Cooper Flagg is removing any suspense from projections. The projected No. 1 overall pick is coming off a historic performance that reignited the hype…
syndication.bleacherreport.com
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This post was also helpful, aggregated from four mainstream sites in November. KJ on all, Will on 3
Yes, I remember when we were recruiting KJ, nobody even knew who he was at first.
The fact that they were on one publication’s mock and not on virtually any others just proves the point that they were far from being “unanimous” 2025 draft selections at the time (like they are now).
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Hope Brad is watching this Celtics series…
Dan
Admin
Illinois to Play Alabama Nov. 19 at United Center - University of Illinois Athletics
Ticket sales information will be announced when available.
fightingillini.com
Total speculation:
- Kansas in KC (Since 2021, KU has played in KC every other year and BU seems to enjoy playing in KC), return game in Chicago in 2026.
- Home and home w/Louisville (ACC moving down to 18 conference games will open additional non con options; Louisville is not committed to a preseason tourney)
- Neutral site w/UConn at MSG (Brad likes MSG and gives east coast alumni opportunity to support team)
That leaves us with:
KU in KC
Alabama in Chicago
Louisville at home
UConn at MSG
KJ was predicted to be a NBA draft pick when he signed. Most never felt he would be here after one year .
I only attached one article stating this , but here are plenty.
Source: Lithuania's Kasparas Jakucionis commits to Illinois
Kasparas Jakucionis, a 6-foot-6 guard from Lithuania who is a potential first-round pick in the 2025 NBA draft, has committed to Illinois, a source told ESPN.
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