Tacomallini
- Washington State
De Sousa didn't foul out but was in foul trouble all game and only played 18 minutes
Illinois 54, Chattanooga 53 Postgame
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100% agree. This is the biggest issue I have with Illinois' offense. When you give it to Kofi in the post from the high wing, you need to cut to the corner for the 3 and everyone else needs to rotate to fill your spot. If you are curbelo you need to cut to the hoop (since he cannot shoot). They ALL stand there and just watch, and there is a guy standing there alone on the weak side where Jokic would have a tough time finding him, let alone Kofi.
The other big issue is they don't box out consistently on defense. If they could fix those two items they'd be way better. The super terrible turnovers by Curbelo are also bad, but much harder to fix because his habits are going to die hard.
Cook
- Richmond, VA
Props to the Alumni Assoc. and marketing team! I'm particularly impressed with the towel, being that we're in Pittsburgh and nodding at the Steelers terrible towel. Although I hope they spelled OSKEE right 
From the article linked on home page:
From the article linked on home page:- A massive glass ceiling dome lit up in an orange-and-blue pattern.
- Small orange towels bearing the phrase “OKSEE WOW TOWEL.”
- And a huge tournament bracket with nearly every team’s name written in black marker — save for Illinois, which was scrawled in orange.
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I admittedly have not been able to watch too many games this season, but caught a solid chunk of last night’s. Is there anybody on this team that has a string mid range game? It looked like our offense was pass or dribble around the outside to try to get an open 3, an open passing lane/good seal for Kofi, or occasionally Curbelo splitting the screen and driving before making some interesting pass choices.
I know Kofi needs the lane, but did not see a lot of cuts through the middle or even back door, nor much creativity from the offense. A mid range game would go a long way ok this team - seems to be one of the biggest holes with Ayo gone.
Just two cents from a fan who hasn’t watched much, so could be way off, but this game and the few I’ve watched seem to consistently lack any mid range offensive game.
That and DMW needs to grow up and shoot the damn ball because he can knock down 3s and doesn’t get on too many scouting reports like Plummer and Frazier.
I know Kofi needs the lane, but did not see a lot of cuts through the middle or even back door, nor much creativity from the offense. A mid range game would go a long way ok this team - seems to be one of the biggest holes with Ayo gone.
Just two cents from a fan who hasn’t watched much, so could be way off, but this game and the few I’ve watched seem to consistently lack any mid range offensive game.
That and DMW needs to grow up and shoot the damn ball because he can knock down 3s and doesn’t get on too many scouting reports like Plummer and Frazier.
sacraig
- The desert
Sure. But a lot of the complaints are things like "RJ is better than _______." But we haven't seen how he's been playing in practice lately. BU has. Like everyone, BU makes mistakes, but a number of people on here think they know universally better than him.
Illini_1979
- Oregon
I'm not seeing too much love for Kofi in this thread but I think he had a solid game with guys draped all over him all night.
DB11Headband
- Chicago Burbs
RJ’s length will be needed tomorrow on the perimeter. Color me extremely surprised he didn’t get any run last night.
Curbelo's TO's sometimes make you want to punch the TV. But at the same time he makes plays nobody else can make and the whole tempo of the game changes in our favor when he is out there. Plus he is a great rebounder for his size and is a highly underrated defensive player.
Illini shooting last night:
- 38.8% from the floor for the game.
- 59% from the free throw line.
- 17.6% from three. Plummer was 3-8 and everyone else went 0-9.
- Gave up 16 offensive rebounds and were out-rebounded by Chattanooga 43-41.
- Trent 0-6, Curbelo 1-7 from the floor.
- Chattanooga took 65 shots. Illinois took 49.
- Ayo 2-9 from the field. 0-3 from three.
Cook
- Richmond, VA
He does deserve more credit than he generally gets (too taken for granted, and that's saying something for a 1st team AA). However, I also find myself wondering how he misses as many bunnies as he does and seems less inclined this year than last year to just rip the rim off with a power dunk. Sort of feel like we're still waiting for him to absolutely dominate a big game at a "player of the year" level. And yes I know he's getting fouled to death.
but he is an Illini and he did play last night....
Take a look at the picture. Hawkins blocked it with his left hand instead of reaching across with his right.
How many players in all of College bball have a strong mid-range game? It's almost all 3 pointers or close to the rim. Interestingly enough, the best mid-range scorer in NBA history was David Thompson according to some analysis. What wouldn't I give to see some game like his on our team.
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IlliniKat91
- Chicago, IL
Is there any chance the staff just wanted to limit film on the freshmen?
They had limited minutes in the conference season that teams could draw on, but I wonder if they're being held back to create planning problems later on if we were to make it. I'm just speculating.
IlliniKat91
- Chicago, IL
I did notice that. I was also impressed that he waited for Smith to get in the air, then jumped. I don't know if it was intentional, but it worked out so he was at his apex as Smith was falling and was able to get a solid block on the ball.
But we have seen what's going on in the games and the freshmen can get back doored ,beat off the dribble ,miss wide open shots ,and not box out too . The difference is that one is 19 and the others are 22-23 years old . Practice only gets you so far because when the ball goes up you gotta be able to carry that practice over to the game otherwise all it is is older guys with experience taking advantage of youngers guys without it and then wilting when they get in the game and are faced with others with experience.
This team has been flat for weeks we are running out the same guys and the same slow starts keep happening you can only sell being older as being better for so long without it actually showing up in the games
Ayo had a fantastic mid range game.
But yes. The mid range game in general is being lost throughout basketball. The slasher has also become a lost role and that’s something we could use with Kofi in the post.
InDaAZ
- Eugene, Oregon
Let’s try a little experiment.
I don’t know you, so allow me to guess you’re 6’ tall - 1 foot shorter than Kofi. So, to compensate for the difference, let’s put you on a court with a 9’ rim and surround you with two or three 5- and 5 1/2 - ft guys, say 20-30 lbs. lighter than you, and tell them to aggressively hack, grab, and hang on you every time you have the ball in the paint.
Now, let’s see what your shooting percentage is - how many bunnies you miss and how hard it is to dominate with ‘power dunks.’ I think you’ll find it to be quite difficult and incredibly tiring.
Even Evil Roy has his style crimped by aggressive smaller people.
Listening to chatanoogas coach, one portion of their gamenplan they thought would be a strength against us was offensive rebounds, being relentless on the glass. It looks like that they had 16 offensive rebounds. May have helped them with second chance points and denying us the opportunity to score. It seemed like the widest disparity in the teams stats side by side as well. It seems like Houston is also aggressive on that front. We will need to be up to to the task of rebounding well. We will need kofi, hawkins, curbelo, Melendez to be out there significant amount of time and damonte and others to be aggressive on glass. We can't be caught ball watching from here on out. Take care of that and I feel we take care of Houston.
EDIT: Just my uneducated opinion of course
EDIT: Just my uneducated opinion of course
Cook
- Richmond, VA
Trust me I get it. I flat out would not want to play with the abuse he takes, and definitely wouldn't be able to keep my cool the way he does. My observation was more comparing my un-researched sense of this year vs. last year (I hadn't looked up his fg% yet). After checking, Kofi was 65.4% last year, 59.5% this year. Do you think he was getting fouled less last year though? Also, I'm a huge Kofi fan (check my avatar) and not trying to be overly critical of him, more of a wondering out loud...
Exactly right, Ayo's mid-range game made him much more dangerous and unpredictable. Teams had to try guarding him on the entire floor. When you only shoot 3's or go to the hoop you have effectively eliminated 1/3 of the floor (or more) that the defense has to worry about being your scoring zone.
Trust is most definitely earned. But trust is like the old story about getting hired for a job..
'Do you have any experience?'
'No. How should I get experience?'
'You have to do the job. Sorry, can't hire you without experience.'
'Uh... OK.'
Coaches know a lot about their players. But... since young players are human beings... coaches DON'T know how a player would react in any given situation.
Sure, they might struggle. But these talented young men might succeed, too. And the minutes on the floor in certain pressure situations would grow them greatly as players.
The last three minutes? Maybe not. But you've got to find four or five minutes in the game somewhere to give these guys a chance to show what they can do... or that they CAN'T deliver and need to find another level of play somewhere.
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