Illini Basketball 2026-2027

#226      
Illinicpa14
Det_Illini_fan said:
My two cents: I think it’s a bit crazy to still not consider us a top 10 or higher team at this point. We’re without 2 starters, but knocking on the door of getting one, a NPOY candidate, back imminently. We were shell-shocked from TTU, but even down these starters who are our best communicators, we still came back to within 1 of a top contending team.

We’ve been playing sloppy, but that’s not indicative of our best or even normal performance. The things we’re struggling with are the easiest to train and fix in practice, but also have seemed more like a mentality thing than anything else. Duke will be tough, but we could still do damage and even win. They’re not a finished product either.

We just need to lock in more and we’ll meet the expectations we started the season with. We’ve had a truly microscopic sample size this far.

Sky is not falling
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Of course not - yet half the board does this every year.

Every year we drop 1-2 bad games in November/early December because they’re humans and this isn’t NBA2k that you win every game.

Then Brad and team make adjustments in December and we come out and play great basketball in January/February
 
#227      
wncillini
Illinicpa14 said:
Of course not - yet half the board does this every year.

Every year we drop 1-2 bad games in November/early December because they’re humans and this isn’t NBA2k that you win every game.

Then Brad and team make adjustments in December and we come out and play great basketball in January/February
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I mean 2 things can be true at the same time.

This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team.

Also, there's plenty of reasons to be optimistic the team we see in the tournament will be much improved over what's currently on the court.

Since having everyone ready during summer to make a run at Texas tech, duke, uconn, and Missouri already appears to be an uphill battle, getting them ready for the grinder between mid January through mid February is next.
 
#228      
EmpoweredIllini
wncillini said:
I mean 2 things can be true at the same time.

This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team.

Also, there's plenty of reasons to be optimistic the team we see in the tournament will be much improved over what's currently on the court.

Since having everyone ready during summer to make a run at Texas tech, duke, uconn, and Missouri already appears to be an uphill battle, getting them ready for the grinder between mid January through mid February is next.
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i would just say team on the court now is missing an all american and another starter, so what do we expect?

but more than that, its won games by 75, 42 and 22 points and losing by 6 to the #16 team on the road in a crazy hostile environment

further, team is rated 6th on kenpom, 9th on torvik and 3rd on evan miya (all adjusted to comp level)

joe lunardi just picked us to win the national championship

the team as it is now (which its way too early to say this, but its also way too early to say borderline tourney team too) profiles as a high seed

and we get to add david and jake to this
 
#229      
lstewart53x3
wncillini said:
I mean 2 things can be true at the same time.

This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team.

Also, there's plenty of reasons to be optimistic the team we see in the tournament will be much improved over what's currently on the court.

Since having everyone ready during summer to make a run at Texas tech, duke, uconn, and Missouri already appears to be an uphill battle, getting them ready for the grinder between mid January through mid February is next.
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Borderline tournament team is a bit of a stretch. Removing Torvik’s preseason expectations and only looking at this seasons data, we’re still ranked #22. Pretty solidly a tournament team even before two starters return:

IMG_0759.jpeg
 
#230      
SkyysNotFalling
This season I predict will go a lot like Kofi & Trent’s final year.

For those that remember- Kofi was suspended to begin the season & we started something like 5-4. We played UTRGV and won something like 100-87. We also lost to Cincinnati early and we looked pretty discombobulated.

In March we sealed a B1G title on the last day of the regular season with a win over Iowa.

It’s still really early, our best guy and team leader is out due to injury. We’re playing 4 freshmen big minutes.

The season, and our success, is far far far from finished.

And this team, once it starts to click and guys get back on the floor, will be a national title contender, no doubt.
 
#232      
SkyysNotFalling
Also,

If going into the season our rotation was going to be

Brown
Coleman
Stojakovic
Williams
T

Z
Zens
Vaaks

We’d be happy we fought hard to comeback against tech & encouraged by how far along our freshmen are and daydreaming of where we could be by January/Febraury.

Expectations dilutes happiness.

We still got a NPOY candidate on the way.

We’re fine
 
#233      
wc_illini
lstewart53x3 said:
Borderline tournament team is a bit of a stretch. Removing Torvik’s preseason expectations and only looking at this seasons data, we’re still ranked #22. Pretty solidly a tournament team even before two starters return:

View attachment 52627
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Counterpoint:

The claim was "This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team."

At #22, we're definitely in the "Tournament Team" range, but we're ~13pts/100 away from #1 and only ~6pts/100 away from #45.
 
#234      
lstewart53x3
wc_illini said:
Counterpoint:

The claim was "This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team."

At #22, we're definitely in the "Tournament Team" range, but we're ~13pts/100 away from #1 and only ~6pts/100 away from #45.
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Alright man.
 
#235      
lstewart53x3
wc_illini said:
Counterpoint:

The claim was "This team on the court now looks more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline championship team."

At #22, we're definitely in the "Tournament Team" range, but we're ~13pts/100 away from #1 and only ~6pts/100 away from #45.
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Let’s try this it this way:

With the expansion of the tournament to 76 teams, 44 teams will get at large bids. So to be a borderline tournament team, we’d need to be playing like the 40th team right now. That’s Oregon in Torvik.

Do you think Oregon would have:

Beat #342 FDU by more than 75?
Beat #131 Penn by more than 42?
Lost @ #11 Texas Tech by less than 6?
Beat #142 Sam Houston by more than 22?

Oregon’s resume includes:

An 18 point win over #203 Montana
A 27 point win over #186 Eastern Washington
A 34 point win over #361 Mississippi Valley

We’ve played the *much* tougher schedule up to this point, yet our +- on the season so far is +33.3/game. Oregon’s is +26.3/game. If you remove our game against Texas Tech because Oregon hasn’t played a comparable opponent, it’s:

IL +46.3
ORE +26.3

Compare that to Duke. We can still agree that Duke is still a borderline contender, right?

On the season, they’re at +33.0 (compared to our +33.3).

So to say we’re playing like a borderline tournament team is silly. Sure, you could say we’re playing more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline contender, but I’d still disagree.

And the point is moot anyhow because how the team is playing right now without two starters isn’t how the team will be playing in March/April.
 
#237      
wc_illini
lstewart53x3 said:
Let’s try this it this way:

With the expansion of the tournament to 76 teams, 44 teams will get at large bids. So to be a borderline tournament team, we’d need to be playing like the 40th team right now. That’s Oregon in Torvik.

Do you think Oregon would have:

Beat #342 FDU by more than 75?
Beat #131 Penn by more than 42?
Lost @ #11 Texas Tech by less than 6?
Beat #142 Sam Houston by more than 22?

Oregon’s resume includes:

An 18 point win over #203 Montana
A 27 point win over #186 Eastern Washington
A 34 point win over #361 Mississippi Valley

We’ve played the *much* tougher schedule up to this point, yet our +- on the season so far is +33.3/game. Oregon’s is +26.3/game. If you remove our game against Texas Tech because Oregon hasn’t played a comparable opponent, it’s:

IL +46.3
ORE +26.3

Compare that to Duke. We can still agree that Duke is still a borderline contender, right?

On the season, they’re at +33.0 (compared to our +33.3).

So to say we’re playing like a borderline tournament team is silly. Sure, you could say we’re playing more like a borderline tournament team than a borderline contender, but I’d still disagree.

And the point is moot anyhow because how the team is playing right now without two starters isn’t how the team will be playing in March/April.
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Oregon isn't playing like the 40th team, though. They're playing like the 60th team

Also, Torvik doesn't just use the final score. Part of his method is to account for game flow, so the fact that we let SHSU hang around for 30 minutes and were down for so much of the game to TT holds us back.
 
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#238      
Calvin
Until proven otherwise, I'm going with the likelihood that being down 2 starters and giving a lot of tick to the freshman will make us more dangerous come March/April. They struggled pretty badly in the first half of their first road game, but is that unexpected?
They've been fun to watch IMO. Just have to be patient, and hope Mirk and then Jake come back while the freshmen get some meaningful experience. Might be a bumpy ride while we're down a couple guys as valuable as Mirk and Jake.
 
#239      
lstewart53x3
wc_illini said:
Oregon isn't playing like the 40th team, though. They're playing like the 60th team

Also, Torvik doesn't just use the final score. Part of his method is to account for game flow, so the fact that we let SHSU hang around for 30 minutes and were down for so much of the game to TT holds us back.
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Remove the word “more” from the original quote. In your opinion, are we playing like a borderline tournament team? Are bubble teams winning games by 75? Are they beating 130s KenPom teams by 42?
 
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#244      
wc_illini
lstewart53x3 said:
Remove the word “more” from the original quote. In your opinion, are we playing like a borderline tournament team? Are bubble teams winning games by 75? Are they beating 130s KenPom teams by 42?
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Seems silly to spend this much time talking about something that nobody was claiming in the first place, but I'll go along. No, we aren't playing like either a borderline tournament team nor a borderline championship contender. I'm comfortable with how Torvik's AdjO/AdjE puts it:
1794714921932.png
 
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