Illinois 64, VCU 46 POSTGAME

#176      

Deleted member 29907

D
Guest
Deleted member 29907
Rowdypkunk said:
I know you're not trying to pick a fight.... and sure Baylor could've played their worst game you will see all season... but we also clearly did not play our best for the full 40 minutes. Also, look at how they started against Louisville... they started off really bad.... and battled back to win that game & the title of the tourney.

But lets take that Baylor team & that game against us.... they are clearly the best team we've faced this year so far, with you guys being a close 2nd (no disrespect intended). We played our best against Baylor for about 25-30 minutes of those 40... if we had played all 40 minutes at our best... we could've beaten them.

Yesterday... we played our best against you guys for the first 8 to 10 minutes.... and then it was all you guys for most of the game after that... tho we had a few runs to get it close.... but then we unraveled again.

We held you guys to 4 points the first 8 minutes of the game.... if we played that well all game... you would've had 20 pts the entire game.... you had 27 pts in the last 12 minutes of the first half we had 10.

2 totally different games by us.... one game VCU showed up for most of the game... but came up just short...... the other game we showed up for a few minutes & it wasn't even close at the end.

Again, not taking anything away from you guys, cause y'all kicked our butts yesterday. But we also did not show up to play... you guys did.

I still think, if we played up to our potential all 40 minutes against Baylor, we could've snuck out a win.... and if we had showed up to play against you guys, we could've won. But the fact of the matter is, we didn't do either.... and therefore we are 6-2 now instead of 7-1 or 8-0.
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You are missing my point. its all speculation and wishes because you really don't know. We could make the point that if we had played near our full game capability we would have beat VCU by 28 rather than 18 - but how can we really know? Perhaps VCU is not as good a you think they are? I can tell you by the way VCU reacted to the zone defense - you did not look like a scary team. Our sharpshooting 3 point shooter went blank. We we 1-12 at the start, etc. Whether you're playing well on O or not, your D was not scary and that should be more consistent. That same sharpshooter who went O-fer drove on your D and he's been unable to do that the entire season.... If you had played better, sure you could have won. IF we had played less than mediocre, we could have lost. If we had played well 40 minutes - we'd have blown you out. Whats the point speculation?
 
#177      

Deleted member 29907

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Guest
Deleted member 29907
Rowdypkunk said:
So are you saying that you guys didn't do the whole "If we had done this, or had done that" when you guys lost to Winthrop?... Cause I'm sure I could go look at y'all's game threads on Winthrop and find several cases where y'all did.
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Sure, we do. We do it on our board, not Winthrop's. Get the difference?
 
#179      

Calvin

C
Calvin
Rowdypkunk said:
Tonight we certainly did not look like a tourney team... We just need to wake up!!! and get our head out of our butts & play like the team I know we can!
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Happy to see a strong performance, especially holding a decent team to 46. The two losses to top-25 teams shouldn't hurt us. Winthrop got away, so that one hurts a little. These may not shape up to be good wins, but they at least give us something on the resume. The real issue is just playing well, and we played a lot better. Might actually have some momentum by the time we get to the tough conference schedule.

Happy for the team :)
 
#180      

Rowdypkunk

R
Richmond, VA
Rowdypkunk
illini8507 said:
So losing to Queens says nothing about your team just because it was an exhibition?
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Considering during most exhibitions coaches like to mix & match, try things they wouldn't normally do... I didn't take too much out of the game.... For example at the very end we were down by 2 and Wade was trying to tell them to call a time out... so we could advance the ball and set up a play for a chance to either tie or win the game.... but they decided to inbound the ball & try to heave it up from beyond half court & it wasn't even close... and Wade was visibly upset about it. And Coach Wade even said towards the end of that game he let them go out there and call their own plays since they weren't running the plays he was calling & hopes it was a learning experience for them.

I would've said the same thing if we had blown out Queens.

Serious Late said:
But to be clear, we can get away with playing a D-2 school since we play in a high major conference. A-10 can't give up those games, since the conference season doesn't help boost SOS like it does a high major conference.
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While you are correct on that.... scheduling D-2 schools does not really help in regards to making the tourney as an at large team. For example.... If it were march and the committee was picking the 68 teams, and lets say hypothetically Illinois was on the bubble.... While you have wins over 2 decent schools in NC State & VCU.... and you still have BYU to play.... they could also look at your schedule and see games like SEMO and NKU which are very low mid majors & a D-II school in McKendree... and not put you in the tourney unless you wow them in conference play.... which is certainly possible considering the tough conference you all play in. The committee might view that as "playing it safe" so to speak.

Either way... I hope you guys continue to play well the rest of the season, and hopefully we get our act together & play like I know we can.
 
#181      

Deleted member 342779

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Guest
Deleted member 342779
Rowdypkunk said:
I know you're not trying to pick a fight.... and sure Baylor could've played their worst game you will see all season... but we also clearly did not play our best for the full 40 minutes. Also, look at how they started against Louisville... they started off really bad.... and battled back to win that game & the title of the tourney.

But lets take that Baylor team & that game against us.... they are clearly the best team we've faced this year so far, with you guys being a close 2nd (no disrespect intended). We played our best against Baylor for about 25-30 minutes of those 40... if we had played all 40 minutes at our best... we could've beaten them.

Yesterday... we played our best against you guys for the first 8 to 10 minutes.... and then it was all you guys for most of the game after that... tho we had a few runs to get it close.... but then we unraveled again.

We held you guys to 4 points the first 8 minutes of the game.... if we played that well all game... you would've had 20 pts the entire game.... you had 27 pts in the last 12 minutes of the first half we had 10.

2 totally different games by us.... one game VCU showed up for most of the game... but came up just short...... the other game we showed up for a few minutes & it wasn't even close at the end.

Again, not taking anything away from you guys, cause y'all kicked our butts yesterday. But we also did not show up to play... you guys did.

I still think, if we played up to our potential all 40 minutes against Baylor, we could've snuck out a win.... and if we had showed up to play against you guys, we could've won. But the fact of the matter is, we didn't do either.... and therefore we are 6-2 now instead of 7-1 or 8-0.
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Illinois had some great looks early in game, just didn't make shots. Thought the spread could have been much greater had Illinois executed. We'll see how VCU finishes up...playing against a weak A10, they'll rack up some wins. But that's what mid majors do....gain confidence against weaker competition, roll into tourney and get an upset or two at times. If they played against legit Power 5 schools all the time, they would get beat up. You'll no longer be a mid major when you join a Power 5 conference. Don't see that happening anytime soon. Good Luck with the rest of season.
 
#182      

Lord Snow

Lord Snow
Lord Snow
Rowdypkunk said:
So are you saying that you guys didn't do the whole "If we had done this, or had done that" when you guys lost to Winthrop?... Cause I'm sure I could go look at y'all's game threads on Winthrop and find several cases where y'all did.

You're right every team does it.... however there have been times that I've said we played our best and just got flat out beat when we've lost before....

2 years ago when we played Villanova in the Barclays in November, When we played Michigan in the NCAA Tourney in 2013, The Butler game in the Final 4 in 2011, vs Oklahoma in 2008-09.... all of those games I said we just flat out got beat. Also none of those games were one or two possession games where one or two things could change the outcome of the game.

But in order to be able to say you played your best and just got beat.... you have to know what your best is. And let's be honest.... anyone who watched the game yesterday.... and watched our game against Baylor where we still could've played better..... knows that we did not play our best yesterday... plain and simple.
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I actually don't think we did go into the whole our team didn't play the best thing. We went into "our team is garbage" and "fire Groce immediately" mode. Which only intensified following two more consecutive losses. But then, a ray of hope as we seemed to finally figure out a successful line up and that has resulted in back to back quality wins.
 
#183      

Serious Late

Serious Late
Peoria via Denver via Ann Arbor via Albuquerque vi
Serious Late
Rowdypkunk said:
While you are correct on that.... scheduling D-2 schools does not really help in regards to making the tourney as an at large team. For example.... If it were march and the committee was picking the 68 teams, and lets say hypothetically Illinois was on the bubble.... While you have wins over 2 decent schools in NC State & VCU.... and you still have BYU to play.... they could also look at your schedule and see games like SEMO and NKU which are very low mid majors & a D-II school in McKendree... and not put you in the tourney unless you wow them in conference play.... which is certainly possible considering the tough conference you all play in. The committee might view that as "playing it safe" so to speak.
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The fact that we played a few games against weak teams early in our schedule will have 0 impact on whether or not we make the tourney. Absolutely zero.
 
#185      

IlliniFan12

I
Cedar Falls, IA
IlliniFan12
VCU scored their lowest point total since 2005. But I'm sure that's 100% because they "didn't show up".......right.
 
#186      

IWannaBeLikeDee

I
rockford, il
IWannaBeLikeDee
Man, I've had a lot of fun watching these last two games. It seems like things are starting to gel and our pieces are starting to fit together. This year we have options, for once. JCL's stroke was way off from deep, Mav was half asleep a la sophomore year, Thorne didn't seem to have the touch on his put shot that he typically does, and Malcolm wasn't on fire: last couple of years that would put us in a real tough spot. This year though? No problem! Tracy's hot shooting continues, Leron was really something special (My play of the game was the save he had at the end, it summarized his play and passion IMO).

Really happy for Groce and staff and the team. Really was impressed listening to Leron, he seems incredibly humbled and grateful for his second chance. Also, initially I thought Tracy's shooting would go through an extremely rough stretch and his overall percentage would revert back to much closer to his old 3 pt%. Now, I'm not so sure and would probably bet against that. Confidence is there, stroke is much better, selection is better. I don't think he'll shoot 60% from 3 for the season but I think it will be an impressive number for sure.

Overall I'm back to cautiously optimistic. The pieces are there. We've got great experience and our old guys are starting to show new tricks. They've made savvy plays that we haven't seen in years. Most of all our guys are hungry, even more so than us fans. :illinois:
 
#187      

WesterveltVictoryCigar

WesterveltVictoryCigar
WesterveltVictoryCigar
Rowdypkunk said:
While you are correct on that.... scheduling D-2 schools does not really help in regards to making the tourney as an at large team. For example.... If it were march and the committee was picking the 68 teams, and lets say hypothetically Illinois was on the bubble.... While you have wins over 2 decent schools in NC State & VCU.... and you still have BYU to play.... they could also look at your schedule and see games like SEMO and NKU which are very low mid majors & a D-II school in McKendree... and not put you in the tourney unless you wow them in conference play.... which is certainly possible considering the tough conference you all play in. The committee might view that as "playing it safe" so to speak.
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No, the......y don't .... see the.... McKendree game... it's not.... taken into....... consideration as part..... of our resume..... That's the whol....e... freakin' po....int of.... why everyone is..... scheduling them t...hese days. ....You get the ho...me gate ....revenue and it..... doesn't affect....... your .......NCAA ..........status.
 
#188      

Serious Late

Serious Late
Peoria via Denver via Ann Arbor via Albuquerque vi
Serious Late
WesterveltVictoryCigar said:
No, the......y don't .... see the.... McKendree game... it's not.... taken into....... consideration as part..... of our resume..... That's the whol....e... freakin' po....int of.... why everyone is..... scheduling them t...hese days. ....You get the ho...me gate ....revenue and it..... doesn't affect....... your .......NCAA ..........status.
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If you are in a high major conference, that is. Mid-Major conferences, even high Mid-Majors like the AAC, C-USA, A-10 and Mountain West, all still have to utilize the non-conference slate to boost their resumes as much as possible since the conference season won't boost their resumes like the B1G will.
 
#189      

WesterveltVictoryCigar

WesterveltVictoryCigar
WesterveltVictoryCigar
Serious Late said:
If you are in a high major conference, that is. Mid-Major conferences, even high Mid-Majors like the AAC, C-USA, A-10 and Mountain West, all still have to utilize the non-conference slate to boost their resumes as much as possible since the conference season won't boost their resumes like the B1G will.
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Actually the Mountain West has been leading the charge in playing non D1 teams. Last few years almost all of their teams have played at least one of these games, many of the play 2. Because not only does it help their team RPI, it also has the same effect on league RPI since they all play each other during league play. Some A10 teams doing it too, though it doesn't seem as widespread there.
 
#190      

kuhl84

K
Orlando, FL
kuhl84
WesterveltVictoryCigar said:
No, the......y don't .... see the.... McKendree game... it's not.... taken into....... consideration as part..... of our resume..... That's the whol....e... freakin' po....int of.... why everyone is..... scheduling them t...hese days. ....You get the ho...me gate ....revenue and it..... doesn't affect....... your .......NCAA ..........status.
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Knew this was coming, just a matter of time.
 
#191      

illini8507

illini8507
illini8507
WesterveltVictoryCigar said:
Actually the Mountain West has been leading the charge in playing non D1 teams. Last few years almost all of their teams have played at least one of these games, many of the play 2. Because not only does it help their team RPI, it also has the same effect on league RPI since they all play each other during league play. Some A10 teams doing it too, though it doesn't seem as widespread there.
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Very interestinteresting. I hadn't really thought of it like that, but makes total sense.
 
#193      

WesterveltVictoryCigar

WesterveltVictoryCigar
WesterveltVictoryCigar
illini8507 said:
Very interestinteresting. I hadn't really thought of it like that, but makes total sense.
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Reminds me of 10 years ago or so when the MVC "mandated" that all their programs to start scheduling better and they all gamed the RPI by playing mostly teams that would end up in the 100-200 range. So you had a couple of their teams end up in the top 30 in RPI without really playing anyone tough. I think Missouri St was left out even though their RPI was < 30 because the committee realized what they had done. That's when it started changing to the "who you beat and where you beat them" instead of just RPI numbers.
 
#196      

Illinijose

I
Illinijose
Like I said earlier the facts speak for themselves. Illinois won, but hopefully VCU plays well the rest of the year, that bodes well for both teams.

Anybody have any info on BYU? I believe that is the first game Kipper is eligible to return. Hopefully he can get some minutes.
 
#197      

Illini B-Ball Fan

Illini B-Ball Fan
Illini B-Ball Fan
Illinijose said:
Like I said earlier the facts speak for themselves. Illinois won, but hopefully VCU plays well the rest of the year, that bodes well for both teams.

Anybody have any info on BYU? I believe that is the first game Kipper is eligible to return. Hopefully he can get some minutes.
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See 12/3 Game thread.