Illini Basketball 2025-2026

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#1      

Dan

Dan
Admin
Dan
Welcome to the Illini Basketball thread :illinois:

Tickets | Schedule | Roster

Single game general public tickets go on sale in October.

Tennessee game in Nashville (Sat, Dec 6) general public tickets on sale now at Ticketmaster.


Last year, the Big Ten schedule was released on September 19th, times & TV info was released on October 9th.

DateOpponentTime/TV
Sun, Oct 19Illinois State
(Exhibition Game)
Mon, Nov 3Jackson State
Fri, Nov 7Florida Gulf Coast
Tue, Nov 11Texas Tech
Fri, Nov 14Colgate
Wed, Nov 19Alabama
(Chicago)
Sat, Nov 22Long Island
Mon, Nov 24UT Rio Grande Valley
Fri, Nov 28UConn
(New York)
Sat, Dec 6Tennessee
(Nashville)
Mon, Dec 22Missouri
(St. Louis)
Mon, Dec 29Southern



Illinois' Big Ten opponents for 2025-2026

Home & Away – Maryland, Nebraska, Northwestern
Home Only – Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, Rutgers, Washington, Wisconsin
Away Only – Iowa, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, UCLA, USC
 
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#2      
phats22
look.gif
 
#6      
Brosky
Dan said:
Welcome to the Illini Basketball thread :illinois:


IL Returnees
Ty Rodgers
Kylan Boswell
Jake Davis
Tomislav Ivisic
Ben Humrichous
Jason Jakstys
AJ Redd

IL Signees
Keaton Wagler
Brandon Lee
Zvonimir Ivisic
Andrej Stojakovic
David Mirkovic
Blake Fagbemi
Mihailo Petrovic


Tickets
Tickets Info (fightingillini.com)
Single game general public tickets go on sale in October.
Tennessee game in Nashville Dec. 6th general public tickets on sale now at Ticketmaster.


Reported Non-Conference Games
DateOpponentLocationInfo
Tue, Nov 11Texas TechChampaign
(State Farm Center)		Link
Wed, Nov 19AlabamaChicago
(United Center)		Link
Sat, Nov 22LIUChampaign
(State Farm Center)		Link
Fri, Nov 28UConnNew York
(Madison Square Garden)		Link
Sat, Dec 6TennesseeNashville
(Bridgestone Arena)		Link
Mon, Dec 22MissouriSt. Louis
(Enterprise Center)		Link



Illinois' Big Ten opponents for 2025-2026

Home & Away – Maryland, Nebraska, Northwestern
Home Only – Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, Rutgers, Washington, Wisconsin
Away Only – Iowa, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, UCLA, USC


Last year, the non-conference schedule was released on August 20th, the Big Ten schedule released on September 19th.
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This is a freakin' meatgrinder. Where are the Cupcakes? As Henson always said, the non-con schedule needs to include at least a few teams you "should beat."
 
#8      
Grandpa
Away only B1G games look tough, but besides Mich St and Purdue, are there any returners on those teams?
 
#11      
CoalCity
Brosky said:
This is a freakin' meatgrinder. Where are the Cupcakes? As Henson always said, the non-con schedule needs to include at least a few teams you "should beat."
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So you would prefer 50 point blowouts against a bunch of irrelevant schools in the 300's that you have to watch on BTN+ that make no difference whatsoever in your season (unless you somehow lose) over exciting games against Top 20 teams in primetime on a national network? That help you if you win and don't really hurt you if you lose?

Gimme the top competition every day. Iron sharpens iron.
 
#13      
JKR
CoalCity said:
So you would prefer 50 point blowouts against a bunch of irrelevant schools in the 300's that you have to watch on BTN+ that make no difference whatsoever in your season (unless you somehow lose) over exciting games against Top 20 teams in primetime on a national network? That help you if you win and don't really hurt you if you lose?

Gimme the top competition every day. Iron sharpens iron.
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I got more pleasure from our 112-67 blowout of EIU than our 67-110 loss to Duke. We need a mix of irrelevant and Top 20.
 
#14      
OrangeBlue98
CoalCity said:
So you would prefer 50 point blowouts against a bunch of irrelevant schools in the 300's that you have to watch on BTN+ that make no difference whatsoever in your season (unless you somehow lose) over exciting games against Top 20 teams in primetime on a national network? That help you if you win and don't really hurt you if you lose?

Gimme the top competition every day. Iron sharpens iron.
Click to expand...
In my opinion, you need 3-4 games against lower competition. That’s where you can experiment and get some players additional playing time without the risk of negative repercussions.

As I’ve heard before, you just want to avoid those Quad 2 home non-con games. Stay on the edges of the spectrum.
 
#15      
Bigtex
Playing quality non con teams and losing doesn't help the team and not sure how it prepared them either. The best four non conference teams they played - they lost.

L vs Alabama n
W vs Arkansas n
L vs Tennessee h
W vs Missouri n
L vs Duke n
L vs Kentucky (Ncaa)
 
#18      
NorthShoreIllini
Bigtex said:
Playing quality non con teams and losing doesn't help the team and not sure how it prepared them either. The best four non conference teams they played - they lost.

L vs Alabama n
W vs Arkansas n
L vs Tennessee h
W vs Missouri n
L vs Duke n
L vs Kentucky (Ncaa)
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Couldn't disagree with this more. The positive impact playing (and having a chance to win) a handful of strong non conference games in lieu of cupcakes has on your SOS/KenPom/NET etc alone is worth it for seeding, bubble implications, etc. And yeah those 4 teams who beat us were just better than us. We weren't less prepared to play Kentucky because we lost to Duke/Bama/Tennessee than we would've been had we beat 3 150+ net teams and won. Nor would those 3 wins instead of those 3 regular season losses improved our resume, at all.
 
#19      
PleaseMakeABowlGame
Calvin said:
Honestly, that was a really good play for Iowa. Murray (nearly 39%) slipped out for a wide open look and got the ball. On the miss, they had a chance at the put-back. Can't quite tell from the video, but maybe RJ got the box out to seal it.
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I literally remember the sequence. Illinois up by 5 with around one minute, Iowa gets an and one to cut it to two. Then a bad turnover and Keegan Murray getting fouled on a three, but he only goes 1/3 so and it remains a one point lead. Then DaMonte getting fouled, going 1/2, and then that final play.

A game that you both absolutely should have won, but also should not have (like our Rutgers game in football).
 
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#20      
aveseaboy
Bigtex said:
Playing quality non con teams and losing doesn't help the team and not sure how it prepared them either. The best four non conference teams they played - they lost.

L vs Alabama n
W vs Arkansas n
L vs Tennessee h
W vs Missouri n
L vs Duke n
L vs Kentucky (Ncaa)
Click to expand...
I promise you that these losses and playing against quality teams helps us significantly more than EIU and Chicago St. You're telling me that to be the best of the best you shouldn't be playing the best of the best?
 
#21      
IlliniFanTX
Bigtex said:
Playing quality non con teams and losing doesn't help the team and not sure how it prepared them either. The best four non conference teams they played - they lost.

L vs Alabama n
W vs Arkansas n
L vs Tennessee h
W vs Missouri n
L vs Duke n
L vs Kentucky (Ncaa)
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Bad, bad take.

You'd rather play 3 terrible teams and get a worse SOS, NET ranking, and following that logic, tournament seed? ICYMI Bama, Tennessee and Duke were all HISTORICALLY good last year. I don't get the argument for NOT playing those games. Beating up on cupcakes doesn't prepare you for tournament time any more than losing to good teams does.
 
#22      
Bigtex
what good came out of losing to Duke by 40? what good came out of losing to Tennessee at home? There are enough tough games in the B1G that prepare the team for March.
 
#23      
the juiceman cometh
Bigtex said:
Playing quality non con teams and losing doesn't help the team and not sure how it prepared them either. The best four non conference teams they played - they lost.

L vs Alabama n
W vs Arkansas n
L vs Tennessee h
W vs Missouri n
L vs Duke n
L vs Kentucky (Ncaa)
Click to expand...
Let's say you take all our non-cons last year and convert them to cupcake wins. You end up with a 25-10 record, Q1 record of 6-7 (instead of 8-10), your conference record is still 12-8, your SOS is way worse. Is that really a better resume? And that's the absolute best case scenario. What if you manage to drop one of those Q4 cupcake games? Not likely, but this is sports and they play the games for a reason.

Bigtex said:
what good came out of losing to Duke by 40? what good came out of losing to Tennessee at home? There are enough tough games in the B1G that prepare the team for March.
Click to expand...

But you can't retroactively choose the games that went poorly to jettison. You'd have to get rid of all tough opponents to ensure you don't get that result, which means you're giving up opportunities to add Q1 wins.
 
#24      
Fly Illini Fly!
PleaseMakeABowlGame said:
I literally remember the sequence. Illinois up by 5 with around one minute, Iowa gets an and one to cut it to two. Then a bad turnover and Keegan Murray getting fouled on a three, but he only goes 1/3 so and it remains a one point lead. Then DaMonte getting fouled, going 1/2, and then that final play.

A game that you both absolutely should have won, but also should not have (like our Rutgers game in football).
Click to expand...
Also quite the hectic swing of going nuts rooting for Purdue to win @Wiscy, them losing on a Hepburn three, then 3-16 Nebby going in and winning without their best player right before our game.
 
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#25      
IlliniCub 16
Bigtex said:
what good came out of losing to Duke by 40? what good came out of losing to Tennessee at home? There are enough tough games in the B1G that prepare the team for March.
Click to expand...

No good comes from those losses really, but not much bad comes from them either. The Duke loss was embarrassing but still probably didn't hurt as much as you'd think in the grand scheme.

But if you look at Tennessee, if we hang on to win that one, it would have been very beneficial. That's why you play them, to give you that big potential upside without much downside.
 
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