The guys at "Field of 68" will say that this hansbrough dude said Illinois is a "fringe" tournament team without TSJ. Not so sure he actually said that, and they'd still make the tournament, I believe, w/out TSJ. Anyway, the Illini move on.Tyler Hansbrough is punching the air somewhere tonight
Illinois 72, Iowa State 69 Postgame
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So glad we got the win or he might have been taking some heat today. That post block stare down while the ball was still in play that lead to an ISU 3 was definitely something.
InDaAZ
- Eugene, Oregon
Illwinsagain
- Cary, IL
LOL!!!
IlliniKat91
- Chicago, IL
Nobody played bad D
I "slandered" Luke this year because at the time he wasn't playing well and was not playing well during crunch time. Maybe it was his injury, maybe confidence, not sure. But I called it like I (and most) saw it, he was struggling on both ends.
He is now playing smart (not fouling), still rebounding well and converting open looks. So I am still calling it like I see it, he is now playing much better and was clutch in this win over ISU.
Our defense has been pretty decent in the tournament except for the beginning of the Morehead State game.Nobody played bad D
Especially defense when he denied that late game lob attempt
I just donāt think the in-game announcers can ignore whatās happening in front of them when they call a game, especially when they see him live for the first time. The national studio hosts have always been biased towards the conferences they came out of themselves (typically towards ACC/Big East), but the blackballing bias against TSJ is just glaringly obvious. During game recap, Seth Davis was saying Illinoisā size could give Connecticut problems and you could see other hosts put their head down, literally writhing in their seats and staying silent. Lying cheat Bruce Pearl was the worst (SEC trash). SportsCenter didnāt even cover the game or mention Illinois, but spent over five minutes on Carolina, who lost! ESPN just wrote about the upcoming IL/CT matchup, again using half of the coverage to unnecessarily insert the ārapeā accusation to smear TSJ without facts or context. Edit- Seth Greenberg on ESPN this morning: āIllinois canāt guard Connecticutā. Just like ISU was going to dismantle our offense, right? Just like the narrative that our defense is awful and we couldnāt defend ISU? Just keep proving them all wrong, boys and shock the basketball world.
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IlliniKat91
- Chicago, IL
I've noticed it getting better (particularly from Goode -- he gets a lot of crap but he's been doing a much better job staying ahead of his assignment) but seeing it in infographic form is nice confirmation.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
You can't both say that the press is being unfair when they complain about TSJ refusing to do any media appearances and also complain that the coverage surrounding the games is unfairly ignoring him.
There's a reasonable argument to be made that the Douglas County (KS) State's Attorney has been horribly unfair to TSJ. That will be addressed through the proper channels in due course.
But GIVEN what the Kansas DA decided and the legal jeopardy TSJ is under, everything that has happened since from a basketball perspective is so miraculously lucky (for TSJ, but especially us fans) that I spend every day marveling at it. It is UNBELIEVABLE that we are here after where we were when the charges came out. This was an impossible outcome, full stop.
And I go back to what I've always said through all the basketball and fandom darkness we've all been through the past decade-plus: we, the Illini fanbase, deserve this good fortune, we've earned it.
But don't look a gift horse too closely in the mouth, y'know? The public narrative has been UNIMAGINABLY hands-off about all this.
This team, over the past couple months, has shown a stubbornness when up in games. They find a way to keep the lead. Thatās champion behavior.
So the media has a right to just ignore him, trash him or only pick arguably the best ncaa guard as 3rd team all American because he doesnāt do press conferences? Yeah, I donāt agree with that assessment but Iām not getting into a back-and-forth over this. Letās just agree that we want our team to keep winning and leave it there.
It reminded me of some of the Illini teams of old. I wasn't very nostalgic.
IlliniKat91
- Chicago, IL
No one has trashed him. They've reasonably brought up his pending case and mentioned he can't to interviews, but no one has come out and said he's terrible at basketball. The broadcast team last night gushed over him. The guys from Field of 68 had nothing but positive things to say. Even the most negative piece I read, the one from USA Today, remarked on how talented he is. They were uncomfortable with him playing despite the case being on going.
And if we're all very honest, we'd feel the same way if there had been a dude on ISU or UConn or any other team in the field in the same situation. We'd be more empathetic now, but we'd still have that question mark regarding that player.
Odd question who else had their tv feed miss the stretch from the Domask free throw to right before Goode hit the 3? We have DIRECTV stream and it went to a full commercial for what was I guess a 30 second to and it came back right as Goode hit the 3. We missed like a minute of action. Just odd.
I decided to borrow this one as my avatar for a while.
He's gonna throw his back out one of these days if he keeps trying to keep up those younguns.
Honestly, I think this has WAY less to do with any kind of anti-Illinois or anti-B1G bias from the national media or any nonsense like that. I love Terrence as a basketball player as much as I've ever loved any player, but the simple fact remains that he could quite possibly get convicted of rape in a few months. And while those of us who frequent these boards and have followed the situation know that there's all kinds of nuance that's needed to understand the nature of the charges (and of course no one but God himself actually knows what really happened), if he is convicted of rape, in this #MeToo world we live in, any public commentary made about him along the way is going to be looked at and scrutinized for whether it was "pro-rapist."
So the safer bet for all the talking heads is to just minimize how much they talk about him (and thus, about the Beloved), because therein they minimize their risk of saying the wrong thing about a dude that will be seen by most everyone in the country as a "bad guy." Not saying it's right or fair or anything, but it's the world we live in, and all these people making their living off talking about athletes have to cover their butts as they can. That, to me, is how to make sense of the stark lack of coverage we're getting.
I am so glad to see others reinforcing what I have been seeing all thru the Illini's 3 games. Kenny Williams -everything is North Carolina, Charles Barkley-Everything is Auburn and SEC and so on. I thought the remarks about TJ'S off court issues were off color and totally irrelevant to the game! I hope the Illini cram it down all their throats then refuses to talk to any of them after.
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