Illinois #14 in 11/10 AP Poll

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#27      
theNewGuy
HereSoIDontGetFined said:
I get Purdue barely squeaking out a win as punishable by a leapfrog from number 2, except when number 2 is Houston, who managed to scrape out 65 points against noted college basketball titan Towson.
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Purdue has many more first place votes interestingly enough (36 to houston's 18)
 
#28      
RollChief
Oakland's first 3 games are against Michigan, Purdue, and Houston, whose respective AP ratings are #6, #2, and #1. I'm not sure I can recall a team that had their first 3 games all in the AP top 10. No matter what, every year it feels like Oakland is anomalous in some way.
 
#29      
Juju
AirNeazy said:
I remember back in college in the midst of 4 (!) straight missed tournaments under Groce.......my buddies and I wished we could just be relevant for once to make CBB season more exciting. No title aspirations, no NBA draft picks.....just hoping Mark Smith could lead us to be relevant past January for once.

In the midst of random message board consternation re: Brad's ability to take us deep into March consistently, there's a certain segment of Illini fans forged in the hellscape that was the 2010s (only 2 NCAAT appearances in 11 seasons!) that will never take an AP ranking for granted.
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Mark Smith, holy crap there's a player I had almost completely forgotten about! I remember how hyped we were to get him because at the time, most highly-regarded recruits were spurning us for other teams(my, how times have changed!). Then, he had a "meh" freshman year. Occasional flashes of brilliance, but overall, "meh." Then he became a turncoat and went to Missouri and ignited a rage in me, lol.

Didn't he leave because of not being the centerpiece of the team yet(dude, you're a freshman, ya gotta PROVE you can be THE guy!) and his dad/parents wanted him to be the star and tried to like, force the issue? Then he flamed out and never even made it to the NBA. I can't remember exactly what it was and maybe I'm even thinking of a different player entirely, but I think I remember there being some issue with his parents, or at least his dad, being like LaVar Ball and being obnoxious about "how great a player their son was." Am I right or was that a different player?
 
#30      
Fly Illini Fly!
Fighter of the Nightman said:
Total guess here, but these would be my hypothetical reasons ... remember, it would only take a few pollsters to have had this experience to shift totals in theory.

1) While we both scored a lot and held our opponents to low scores, we were more impressive on the offensive end. Illini won 113-55 and 113-70 compared to Iowa State winning 88-50 and 102-62.
2) Our most impressive result was in our first game where more folks might have been paying attention due to "college basketball being back" compared to Iowa State getting a slightly more impressive victory in its second game.
3) While pollsters probably knew we reloaded with new talent like we always do, I am guessing it carried weight that one of our core returning contributors (Boswell) had the single best performance out of all four combined games, with his 31 points in our opener.
4) Iowa State played both of its games on ESPN Plus, whereas at least one of our games was on "actual TV" - i.e., Big Ten Network ... and it happened to be the more dominant victory.
5) Someone would have to help me here, but did Iowa State have any key contributors out? We had SIGNIFICANT pieces of what this team hopes to be out in both games, and yet we still just looked damn good.

Anywho, just guesses! Lol. For #TeamRankingsMatter and trying to figure out how far we could climb if we can take down the Red Raiders and presumably then go 2-0 this week, here are some games to watch!

Tuesday, November 11
7:00 pm on ESPN | #9 Kentucky at #12 Louisville ... We'd almost certainly pass UL if they lose, and we could definitely pass Kentucky, especially if UL were to win handily.

Thursday, November 13
6:00 pm on ESPN2 | #2 Purdue at #8 Alabama ... I doubt we'd pass Purdue for this road loss, but if the Boilermakers win handily here, I think 'Bama could fall below us.

Friday, November 14
9:00 pm on Peacock | #5 Arizona vs. #15 UCLA (Inglewood, CA) ... Would pollsters reward UCLA for this win more than they would for us beating TTU, allowing the Bruins to pass us?

Saturday, November 15
6:00 pm on FOX | #7 BYU vs. #3 UConn (Boston, MA) ... I think UConn would have to REALLY take it to BYU for the pollsters to drop them below us, given it is effectively a UConn home game, but who knows??

We must take care of business, of course! However, it is fun to imagine this team doing what it takes to maybe be rocking a top 10 ranking when 'Bama comes to the UC ... might help juice up the crowd!
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If we beat TTU, we'll have a top 10 win the same week as all of those games (which is important). I don't think any one loss team would remain above us (other than maybe Purdue).

Florida lost to Arizona and dropped 7 spots. St John's dropped 8.

Maybe unlikely, but I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to jump Purdue if we win. Florida was #3 last week and Bama was #15 but Bama is ahead this week due to the more impressive showing.

I do think we'd jump St John's, one of LVille/KY, TTU, Florida, BYU.

So probably somewhere around 8 or 9.
 
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#31      
Juju
Dan said:
Illinois #14 in AP Poll

apnews.com

NCAA College Basketball Rankings: AP Top 25 Basketball Poll

The official page for the AP Top 25 men's college basketball poll. Keep up to date and view the latest NCAA men's basketball ranking updates each week for the 2025-26 season.
apnews.com apnews.com
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I love how we're #14 in the country, but if you Google "Illini basketball," it has us in dead last place in the B10, even though not a single conference game has been played yet. 😂 I know, I know, even when no conference games have been played yet, SOMEONE has to be listed as dead last in the conference, but I just find it hilarious and weird that Google wouldn't just go by poll rankings and current non-conference W-L when making their standings. 🤷
 
#33      
Fighter of the Nightman
Juju said:
I love how we're #14 in the country, but if you Google "Illini basketball," it has us in dead last place in the B10, even though not a single conference game has been played yet. 😂 I know, I know, even when no conference games have been played yet, SOMEONE has to be listed as dead last in the conference, but I just find it hilarious and weird that Google wouldn't just go by poll rankings and current non-conference W-L when making their standings. 🤷
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Especially odd because usually we are the default "first place" team in the Big Ten before any games have been played due to alphabetical order! :ROFLMAO:
 
#37      
sacraig
Piotyr said:
It's two games into the season. Every team in the Midwest is competing for a 1 in STL and CHI.
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Michael Richards Yes GIF
 
#38      
Fighter of the Nightman
Piotyr said:
It's two games into the season. Every team in the Midwest is competing for a 1 in STL and CHI.
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Every good* team! And how long is that list, realistically? Anything can happen, but I would bet that almost every #1 seed over the last couple decades has been ranked at this point in the season, and I would be the large majority were in the top 15. So, that leaves the following schools who would consider the Chicago Region a "dream spot" rather than just convenient.

#2 Purdue
#6 Michigan
#14 Illinois

And these teams if you extend it to the entire top 25:

#17 Michigan State
#24 Wisconsin

I left off #16 Iowa State and #25 Kansas, as while they both have decent alumni bases in Chicago, they are (A) smaller alumni bases than those other five schools and (B) materially farther away than those schools and/or their fan "center of gravity" is not close to Chicago. I really wish there was also a First Weekend site in Indianapolis or Detroit or something to shift some of those schools away from St. Louis, because St. Louis would be a WAY more advantages home court advantage for us than any of those other schools.

Somewhat OT, but I was looking at the 2026 NCAAT locations, and we really do have a dream potential setup in a way few other teams do. Using the current top 20 as a cutoff for teams "on track" to fight for a protected top 4 seed, these were the only "very favorable paths" I could come up with. I roughly ranked them in order of how much of a home court advantage that team would have OVER the three weekends, and I tried to use a color scheme of green being a true home court advantage (e.g., Illini in Milwaukee last year), yellow being a favorable location but not a huge crowd advantage (e.g., Illini in Des Moines in 2024) and red being not favorable at all (e.g., Illini in Boston in 2024). I included a team if it could get to at least one green and one yellow location on its path to the Final Four OR all three locations were yellow. So while Florida might love to be in Tampa for the First Weekend, both of its next two locations would be red ... thus eliminated.

#14 Illinois: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#2 Purdue: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#17 Michigan State: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#1 Houston: Oklahoma City, OK --> Houston, TX --> Indianapolis, IN
#9 Kentucky: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#15 UCLA: San Diego, CA --> San Jose, CA --> Indianapolis, IN
#16 Iowa State: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN

Every other top 20 team either has zero green locations or can't get to that yellow threshold for all three weekends, and Illinois is the only team that is green the whole way. So yeah, kind of a pointless and admittedly subjective exercise, but I would argue we are playing for more of a "dream path" to a deep Tournament run in front of a ton of our own fans in a way that no other team in the nation is. Let's go get it!!
 
#39      
Iloveorangekoolaid
Fighter of the Nightman said:
Every good* team! And how long is that list, realistically? Anything can happen, but I would bet that almost every #1 seed over the last couple decades has been ranked at this point in the season, and I would be the large majority were in the top 15. So, that leaves the following schools who would consider the Chicago Region a "dream spot" rather than just convenient.

#2 Purdue
#6 Michigan
#14 Illinois

And these teams if you extend it to the entire top 25:

#17 Michigan State
#24 Wisconsin

I left off #16 Iowa State and #25 Kansas, as while they both have decent alumni bases in Chicago, they are (A) smaller alumni bases than those other five schools and (B) materially farther away than those schools and/or their fan "center of gravity" is not close to Chicago. I really wish there was also a First Weekend site in Indianapolis or Detroit or something to shift some of those schools away from St. Louis, because St. Louis would be a WAY more advantages home court advantage for us than any of those other schools.

Somewhat OT, but I was looking at the 2026 NCAAT locations, and we really do have a dream potential setup in a way few other teams do. Using the current top 20 as a cutoff for teams "on track" to fight for a protected top 4 seed, these were the only "very favorable paths" I could come up with. I roughly ranked them in order of how much of a home court advantage that team would have OVER the three weekends, and I tried to use a color scheme of green being a true home court advantage (e.g., Illini in Milwaukee last year), yellow being a favorable location but not a huge crowd advantage (e.g., Illini in Des Moines in 2024) and red being not favorable at all (e.g., Illini in Boston in 2024). I included a team if it could get to at least one green and one yellow location on its path to the Final Four OR all three locations were yellow. So while Florida might love to be in Tampa for the First Weekend, both of its next two locations would be red ... thus eliminated.

#14 Illinois: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#2 Purdue: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#17 Michigan State: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#1 Houston: Oklahoma City, OK --> Houston, TX --> Indianapolis, IN
#9 Kentucky: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN
#15 UCLA: San Diego, CA --> San Jose, CA --> Indianapolis, IN
#16 Iowa State: St. Louis, MO --> Chicago, IL --> Indianapolis, IN

Every other top 20 team either has zero green locations or can't get to that yellow threshold for all three weekends, and Illinois is the only team that is green the whole way. So yeah, kind of a pointless and admittedly subjective exercise, but I would argue we are playing for more of a "dream path" to a deep Tournament run in front of a ton of our own fans in a way that no other team in the nation is. Let's go get it!!
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So both Michigan and Michigan State would go to Buffalo over St. Louis. Also Kentucky is literally nearly equal distance to Greenville, SC. I know we hate him but Lunardi had Kentucky as 2 playing in Greenville and we got a 3 in St. Louis. He’s usually most accurate with locations early in the season before it gets messy. I think Purdue and Iowa State are the 2 highest ranked teams currently we are fighting for STL for. Obviously, everything turns into secondary locations to fight for but it’s nice that the east coast teams like UConn and St.Johns are closer to Philly than Buffalo. That being said, a win tonight would go a long way towards building our dream route.
 
#44      
jamarvelous31
Juju said:
Mark Smith, holy crap there's a player I had almost completely forgotten about! I remember how hyped we were to get him because at the time, most highly-regarded recruits were spurning us for other teams(my, how times have changed!). Then, he had a "meh" freshman year. Occasional flashes of brilliance, but overall, "meh." Then he became a turncoat and went to Missouri and ignited a rage in me, lol.

Didn't he leave because of not being the centerpiece of the team yet(dude, you're a freshman, ya gotta PROVE you can be THE guy!) and his dad/parents wanted him to be the star and tried to like, force the issue? Then he flamed out and never even made it to the NBA. I can't remember exactly what it was and maybe I'm even thinking of a different player entirely, but I think I remember there being some issue with his parents, or at least his dad, being like LaVar Ball and being obnoxious about "how great a player their son was." Am I right or was that a different player?
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Wild post. I think you're conflating Butler and Smith a bit.

Smith was a HS MLB prospect before an injury and then was a late bloomer BB prospect (unranked his jr year).

IIRC he did claim a hostile environment at IL to get eligible immediately. Wild since he now seems like a prototypical Underwood guard, just had a tin man heart.
 
#45      
derrick6
jamarvelous31 said:
Wild post. I think you're conflating Butler and Smith a bit.

Smith was a HS MLB prospect before an injury and then was a late bloomer BB prospect (unranked his jr year).

IIRC he did claim a hostile environment at IL to get eligible immediately. Wild since he now seems like a prototypical Underwood guard, just had a tin man heart.
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Treadmill gate
 
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