Also: the shock and amazement that removing your best player doesn’t result in a better offense
Illinois 73, Penn State 65 Postgame
- Status
Also: the shock and amazement that removing your best player doesn’t result in a better offense
Its almost as if there is a reason he plays 35+ minutes most games.
Well expressed. This is the very reason I am not too excited about Illinois' prospects when it comes tournament time.
Apparently the idea of feeding the bigs is not a big part of the offensive scheme.
But this is exactly what the scheme is designed to protect against. If you have an off shooting night, you give yourself a chance to survive when you rebound 40% of your misses. It’s one of those super obvious things that I’m puzzled how people see the opposite.
we also consistently drove the ball and got fouled - leading to 28 free throws and limiting PSU to 14.
He mentions our team hasn't "embraced Wagler becoming the engine for the offense" when literally starting from the Tennessee game the offense has been undoubtedly elite. Yesterday was the lone not-great game due to HE HIMSELF not being on the court.
It's one thing to say we aren't great without him. It's also woefully ignorant to talk about not embracing him leading the offense, when we've been undeniably great with him on-ball.
We went to Mirk in the post legitimately over and over and over again yesterday
Now, if we wanna critique the roster building that neither of the Z’s are consistent low post scorers. Let’s do it.
I clearly think this was a slog of a game, but that Illinois is still comfortably a top 15 team. Fighting through the whistle and physicality on the road in the B1G is not an easy thing to do.
In order to grow beyond that top 15 level there are legitimate issues they can address, including OOTO plays, developing some coherent offense if Wagler needs to sit and getting more from Tomi.
Tomi absolutely got doubled last night and I wouldn't expect big scoring numbers in that case. I would, and do, expect him to stay engaged and make an impact in other ways and bring energy regardless. It seems the pattern with Tomi this year is if he gets an early 3 or two to fall, he's plugged in. If not, get Z in earlier.
In order to grow beyond that top 15 level there are legitimate issues they can address, including OOTO plays, developing some coherent offense if Wagler needs to sit and getting more from Tomi.
Tomi absolutely got doubled last night and I wouldn't expect big scoring numbers in that case. I would, and do, expect him to stay engaged and make an impact in other ways and bring energy regardless. It seems the pattern with Tomi this year is if he gets an early 3 or two to fall, he's plugged in. If not, get Z in earlier.
Do some of you watch the game? Mirk was the primary initiator on almost every offensive possession when Keaton was out.
Last edited:
I think there are two dimensions here. 100% the analytics matter, but you can also qualitatively opine on a game based on what actually happened..so 2 things can be true
Maybe to illustrate, lets assume we are the losing team. If we play michigan and they are up on us 13-17 the entire game.....then we go on a mini heater in final 90 seconds to lose by like 7..most here wouldnt think we played them close and would call it a fake rally, but that would be better analytically than 15 pts. Either way we'd think we got our arse kicked overall
If we played them the whole game within 5-10 points and lost by 7, i think we'd feel better about the game than the first example even though analytics would read the same
So you can both be like "dammit" about mingo hitting those bombs near the end bc of the small impact to analytics but also realize they really didnt challenge the outcome
Stojakovic slow, unathletic, can’t defend or shoot. Only thing he does is throw up off balance shots although that go in at a 55% rate? I must have been watching a completely different player this season.
Did you prefer Dix or Sarr over Andrej?
……and he was great. Mirk consistently made plays throughout the game that kept the lead comfortable. A previous poster pointed to his maturity. With Wags out, he accepted the challenge before him. That was the biggest takeaway for me.
I know that the risk of foul trouble minimizes their minutes together but I still would like to see some twin towers when Mirk is taking a breather.
The 1:30 mark... Exactly what many people said they wanted to see.
But then it happened. And now hate it.
I get why being a coach would be so frustrating at times lol
It says a lot that Brad has raised the program so high that many around here seem to expect us to play for a Natty every year. I wonder if the irony peeks thru?
I may be looking at the wrong video here, but I am having trouble finding the 1:30 mark of a 1:10 video.
band camp
- STL City
1:03?
BU is talking about getting every teams best.
I haven't watched Creighton at all but Dix looks like he's playing well stat-wise
I’m convinced fans just simply do not watch how an offensive play is ran. It’s simply ball does go in = good offense and ball does not go in = bad offense
Sorry, sorry. 30 second mark
And he could be still better if he fixed some basic flaws in his game such as trying to do too much. Suggesting a way for someone to improve doesn't mean you think they are doing a bad job.
Read the original comment. It wasn’t someone suggesting ways for a player to improve, in fact there was nothing productive or constructive there at all. He just said he was slow, unathletic, bad shooter, can never become a good defender. Thats it.
- Status