I watched a lot of that Creighton game on replay, primarily because my first thought on seeing the score was, "How did that happen???" Honestly, that was a game where Creighton wasn't intimidated, shot the ball well, and the game snowballed from there. UConn was kind of caught off guard and never really recovered. If there's an item that gives me a level of optimism for tomorrow, it's that Illinois won't shy away from the moment. UConn does it a lot differently, but I see a lot of the 2004-2005 Illinois team in terms of off-ball movement and unselfishness. They run more "sets" as opposed to the Bruce Weber read and respond motion, but the objective is the same as you've mentioned.
If I'm Illinois, I try to make it a "black hole" with Clingnan where he has a hard time passing out of the post. He may (and likely will) get his points, but I don't think you double him a whole lot so you keep focus on the shooters. Rotate defenders on him to give him different looks - Hawkins' length compared to Dainja's strength.
UConn is so balanced, that I think you pick your poison and try to slow down everything around that.