Illini Basketball 2025-2026

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#152      
Here’s all our game scores from this season, as well as the offensive and defensive ratings for each game:

View attachment 46461
clearly a couple of reasons why we had a post Thanksgiving to Christmas lull


1. tryptophan hangover is new for the balkans
2. too much Mariah Carey music fried their brains
3. some of them got caught in the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving float. they now hate bald boys
4. they only saw die hard after Christmas when it's clearly a Christmas movie
5. they were nervous that they were bad boys and on the naughty list but Santa reassured them they were on the good list and should play as such
 
#153      
Here's Torvik's blog about game score: https://adamcwisports.blogspot.com/2015/11/introducing-g-score.html

You can also see game by game win probability flow by clicking on a game score, like for example Penn State: https://barttorvik.com/box.php?muid=IllinoisPenn+St.1-3&year=2026

Here's the image of the game flow for that game:
View attachment 46460
As you can see, the lowest the win probability ever got was at the start of the game. From there, the game was consistently 95+% in hand, though the lead was never completely safe until a Stojakovic 3 with 90 seconds left to make it a 13 point game. So, in essence, what we saw. The Illini got out to a solid early lead and sat on it, coasting to the end of the game, though it was never really in doubt. Other games they've secured a safe lead earlier (the Rutgers game was secured with 7:30 remaining and a 25 point lead), but they've largely played well in the vast majority of their games.
I tend think that if we were down by 2 at half time and ended up winning by 8, the negative comments would have been many fewer.
 
#156      
I am surprised the analytics have preferred him over Mara though. But maybe this is just me never fully wrapping my head around some all conference/all star/all pro teams not being fully based on true positions (Morez isn’t a center!)
Yeah the thing with Mara is he turns it over a bunch and his free-throw shooting is abysmal. On the year he's shooting 42%. Morez is shooting 80% on the year at the stripe, his FG% is better, and his TO rate is lower.
 
#157      
What’s the latest with Ty? Is there a realistic chance we could see him in February?
I have not seen or read anything in quite some time. Of course, I could have missed it. But, "80’sIllini” posted this after the Iowa game.

"At one point, one of the announcers said something to the effect that Ty was, and I paraphrase, "Ramping up his workouts but wasn't ready to play in games yet."

Sorry, not much help, but if the announcers know something, then I would think someone with the program (hint, hint) would know something. Maybe they want to keep it secret for a big reveal.
 
#158      
I feel like around this time every year I lose the meaning of what NET is.

Can someone explain how your own NET ranking isn’t a definitive ranking of your team, but only a representation of how good your opponents are?

Also, no one can convince me that it isn’t counterintuitive. I’m ranked 10th and if a team ranked 50th beats me, they have a top 10 NET win, but I can’t claim I’m the 10th best team?
Here is what the NCAA says NET is:

"The remaining factors include the Team Value Index (TVI), which is a result-based feature that rewards teams for beating quality opponents, particularly away from home, as well as an adjusted net efficiency rating. The adjusted efficiency is a team’s net efficiency, adjusted for strength of opponent and location (home/away/neutral) across all games played."

Which is basically kenpom + TVI. TVI is not well described.

So it is an analytic metric for determining the strength of the team, not its opponents.
 
#159      
Yeah the thing with Mara is he turns it over a bunch and his free-throw shooting is abysmal. On the year he's shooting 42%. Morez is shooting 80% on the year at the stripe, his FG% is better, and his TO rate is lower.

He's also taken very few 3s, maybe every other game, but is hitting at a good clip 44%. Having a very good season.
 
#160      
... The problem last year was there were so many games in 20% range. Almost every other night that was the case...
This sums it up right here! No one was ever questioning if we were capable of shooting well from three, lol. But look at our 3-point shooting percentage vs. Power Conference teams last year laid out in chronological order. Each dash is a percentage point, except for the multiples of 10 to make it easier to read. We shot 30% overall in these games, so I used the following key.

34% or Better
27 to 33%
32% or Worse

Nov. 20: ---------10---------20---------30---
Nov. 28: ---------10---------20---------30---------40--------
Dec. 6: ---------10---------20------
Dec. 10: ---------10---------20---------30
Dec. 14: ---------10-------
Dec. 22: ---------10---------20---------30-
Jan. 2: ---------10---------20---------30---------40---------50-----
Jan. 5: ---------10---------
Jan. 8: ---------10---------20---------30--
Jan. 11: ---------10---------20--
Jan. 14: ---------10---------20---------30----
Jan. 19: ---------10---------20-
Jan. 23: ---------10---------20-
Jan. 26: ---------10---------20--------
Jan. 30: ---------10---------20----
Feb. 2: ---------10---------20
Feb. 5: ---------10---------20-
Feb. 8: ---------10---------20---------30---------40---------50------
Feb. 11: ---------10---------20---------30---------
Feb. 15: ---------10---------20-
Feb. 18: ---------10---------20---------30---
Feb. 22: --------
Feb. 25: ---------10---------20---------30-
March 2: ---------10---------20---------30--------
March 7: ---------10---------20---------30-------
March 13: ---------10---------20---------30---------40------
March 14: ---------10---------20--
March 21: ---------10---------20---------30---------40
March 23: ---------10---------20--------

So while there is always variability in every team's performance ... yikes, that is inconsistent! It was pretty difficult to watch a team light it up one night and then have 11 games where we are making fewer than 25% of our threes, 4 games where we are making 20% or fewer and even one game where we made just 7.7% of them for good measure, lol.
As a contrast, this year's team has only shot below 25% twice - a pretty terrible shooting performance vs. UConn that is now looking more and more like the exception rather than the rule and a road game at PSU where the shots weren't falling and we grinded it out. We have had zero games below the 20% mark. If you did the same for this year's team but used last year's "goal posts," it would look like this:

Nov. 11: ---------10---------20---------30--
Nov. 19: ---------10---------20---------30----
Nov. 28: ---------10---------20-
Dec. 6: ---------10---------20---------30---------
Dec. 9: ---------10---------20---------30---------40
Dec. 13: ---------10---------20---------30-----
Dec. 22: ---------10---------20---------30---------40------
Jan. 3: ---------10---------20--
Jan. 8: ---------10---------20---------30------
Jan. 11: ---------10---------20---------30------

Much more consistent and yet ALSO not relying on threes as much! It's exactly what you want, and it's why we have looked so good lately and won games like Penn State semi-comfortably even when the shots weren't falling.
 
#161      
Here is what the NCAA says NET is:

"The remaining factors include the Team Value Index (TVI), which is a result-based feature that rewards teams for beating quality opponents, particularly away from home, as well as an adjusted net efficiency rating. The adjusted efficiency is a team’s net efficiency, adjusted for strength of opponent and location (home/away/neutral) across all games played."

Which is basically kenpom + TVI. TVI is not well described.

So it is an analytic metric for determining the strength of the team, not its opponents.
Yes, your ranking is determined by your performance. But supposedly the committee doesn’t look at your ranking as closely when seeding as they look at your wins and losses.

So the committee is supposed to use NET to categorize your strength by the strength of your wins and losses, not your actual ranking.

But I’m not sure if that’s how it’s actually used in real life, especially over the past few years, where seeding is much closer to the metric rankings.
 
#163      
I like knowing that we have so much depth off the bench, that up to this point we haven’t had to tap into.

The games last year when Tomi was sick, and Morez got into early foul trouble were tough to watch. We can weather some storms this year, when they come!
 
#168      
How do you think he would help this year ? Whose minutes would you want him to take ?
I wish the best for him but Come on?
Do you think he would want to waste a year of NIL money for a few games that he wouldn’t play much ?
 
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#169      
Goodman is such a tool for even insinuating that Brad has soft teams now that he recruits Europeans.

He's on the message board with some frequency (assuming the handle is accurate). I don't think he'd be accused of being overly media savvy. He's blunt and comes across like he's sitting on the couch talking with his buddies. There's a place for that, but whether you think interviewing coaches is one of them YMMV. The lead guy was more polished, but I didn't care for his style personally. Somewhere there's a happy medium of authentic, prepared, and tactful 🤷‍♂️

A team that hasn't practiced together can look soft when they're hesitant, at least that was my take-away from how he handled the question. He likes his guys toughness but the injuries and illness set back their time together.
 
#171      
Wasn't Goodman the guy who declared us finished as soon as TSJ was suspended in 2024? Felt good to come out and absolutely obliterate Northwestern the next game, lol.

Not a fan.

I think he also had some really jump-to-conclusion style tweets/opinions about TSJ charges as well (though I might be misremembering)

Feel as though Brad has probably wanted to offer the Pizza Hut Parking Lotmeeting for a while now
 
#172      
IMG_0074.jpeg
 
#175      
I think he also had some really jump-to-conclusion style tweets/opinions about TSJ charges as well (though I might be misremembering)

Feel as though Brad has probably wanted to offer the Pizza Hut Parking Lotmeeting for a while now
Someone should compile a list of “journalists” that jumped the gun on TSJ. Felt like everyone and their mom insinuated TSJ was an awful human without waiting for the full picture to appear.
 
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