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Rutgers 91, Illinois 88 Postgame
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<blockquote data-quote="JFGsCoffeeMug" data-source="post: 1568518" data-attributes="member: 74571"><p>Hard to know how to respond to this.</p><p></p><p>If you're just talking overall record at Illinois, then I think most would agree that a 0.500 winning percentage is below what we want and expect. But that is heavily impacted by how one feels about Underwood's first two rosters. I happen to think (and it's open to debate) that those first two rosters were mostly about Underwood fixing issues that were left over from the Groce era. And if you believe last season was the turning point and that we'll continue trending up this year and into the future, then that overall record will continue to improve.</p><p></p><p>If you're just looking at last year's record, 21-10 (13-7), I would argue that was a really good season. The B10 was a nightmare last year (at 7 losses, we were only 0.5 a game back from a four-way tie for the conference title). So I wouldn't put too much of an emphasis on how those 7 wins were against unranked teams. Wins, and especially <u>road</u> wins (3 of those 7), were hard to come by in the B10.</p><p></p><p>If you're just saying that we should be winning <u>more</u> than we have been, well, that's difficult to assess. I don't think you can say we are losing all of our close games. Ayo's late-game heroics last year pushed us to a number of wins in that category.</p><p></p><p>Which leads me to my best guess at what you mean. If you're saying based on our talent <u>this year</u> we shouldn't be losing these games, then I guess my response is that talent alone isn't the entire equation. We undoubtedly have a lot of talent on this team, but some of it is young talent (Miller, Curbelo, Hawkins). Some of it is limited or unavailable due to injury (Hutcherson, BBV). And the B10 is arguably even tougher than it was last year. So, yeah, we're going to lose some games. Maybe even a lot of games.</p><p></p><p>But hopefully, through the losses, our younger players gain some valuable experience, some of our players can come back from injuries, and our team can develop the cohesion necessary to make deep runs in the two tournaments.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="JFGsCoffeeMug, post: 1568518, member: 74571"] Hard to know how to respond to this. If you're just talking overall record at Illinois, then I think most would agree that a 0.500 winning percentage is below what we want and expect. But that is heavily impacted by how one feels about Underwood's first two rosters. I happen to think (and it's open to debate) that those first two rosters were mostly about Underwood fixing issues that were left over from the Groce era. And if you believe last season was the turning point and that we'll continue trending up this year and into the future, then that overall record will continue to improve. If you're just looking at last year's record, 21-10 (13-7), I would argue that was a really good season. The B10 was a nightmare last year (at 7 losses, we were only 0.5 a game back from a four-way tie for the conference title). So I wouldn't put too much of an emphasis on how those 7 wins were against unranked teams. Wins, and especially [U]road[/U] wins (3 of those 7), were hard to come by in the B10. If you're just saying that we should be winning [U]more[/U] than we have been, well, that's difficult to assess. I don't think you can say we are losing all of our close games. Ayo's late-game heroics last year pushed us to a number of wins in that category. Which leads me to my best guess at what you mean. If you're saying based on our talent [U]this year[/U] we shouldn't be losing these games, then I guess my response is that talent alone isn't the entire equation. We undoubtedly have a lot of talent on this team, but some of it is young talent (Miller, Curbelo, Hawkins). Some of it is limited or unavailable due to injury (Hutcherson, BBV). And the B10 is arguably even tougher than it was last year. So, yeah, we're going to lose some games. Maybe even a lot of games. But hopefully, through the losses, our younger players gain some valuable experience, some of our players can come back from injuries, and our team can develop the cohesion necessary to make deep runs in the two tournaments. [/QUOTE]
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