I enjoy reading a rant as much as anyone. But at least get the facts correct. The Illini already can do no worse than a double bye. That box is checked.
UCLA 95, Illinois 94 OT Postgame
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Honestly- I know a lot of the talk is about what our coaches called for the defensive scheme in the last play- but with 4.9 seconds left you just have to play defense and stop the guy dibbling the basketball up the court - it doesn’t matter what defense you are in. That’s something second graders learn, stop the guy with the ball first - if you force him to pass or pull up for a shot, we can live with that, but you have to stop ball
Pinning Dent in the corner with 2 guys(probably KB and Stojakovic or even put Lee in) was the obvious answer after the look they gave pre timeout.
All you have to do is make them catch the ball going away from the basket. The one thing you couldn't do was let them catch ball with momentum and keeping moving forward. Then they happened to let Dent catch the ball at full speed where he could just turn up the court.
Noblesville Illini
- Nappanee, IN
MSU has a gauntlet finish. Will be ours to lose for the triple bye.
MDchicago
- Lake Norman NC
In terms of large blown leads by talented Illini teams, the UCLA game reminds me of the time in 1987 the #8 ranked Illini blew a 22 point second half lead at home vs. an undefeated and #2 ranked Iowa team (BJ, Gamble, Marble, Horton, Lohaus, etc.). Relative to UCLA, Iowa had better talent to make the comeback, but had to do it on the road in CU. Iowa ascended to #1 the following week...
87 Illini ended up as a #3 seed losing in the first round to Austin Peay when plenty of bad habits surfaced in a game that should have been won handily. This Illini team is better and has a higher ceiling, but needs to learn from their losses and not FAFO like that 87 team did in March. Remains to be seen, but I still like the upside and make-up of this team.
87 Illini ended up as a #3 seed losing in the first round to Austin Peay when plenty of bad habits surfaced in a game that should have been won handily. This Illini team is better and has a higher ceiling, but needs to learn from their losses and not FAFO like that 87 team did in March. Remains to be seen, but I still like the upside and make-up of this team.
Latulip alluded to as much today. Said the same thing with ballscreen navigation. Seemed far more critical of the players executing than the plan itself.
He did pretty much blow up my theory on just going straight under some bad shooters like Dent and Fears on ball screens though.
It's not even hindsight. It's just what you do in those situations. Force sideline/baseline and try to cut the floor in half.
If you give up the middle for the floor you now have to guard the entire floor and closeout accordingly. Forcing to oneside makes them have to throw longer passes to flip the court when they don't really have time to do so and gives you time to closeout.
We could also say that we will learn from this experience now so it won’t bite us in March.
We can end up 16-4 which would’ve won the title most of the last 10 years and would be in real shot category all but this year bc Michigan is gonna post the best record (assuming 18-2) in over a decade
There were a couple 17-3 winners lately so 1 game back of that is having a shot
Then the previous like 4-5 years that’s an outright title bc most teams were
Winning with records of 14-6 to 15-5
Expaning on this bc i couldnt edit
Last 10 years title records
MSU 17-3
Purdue 17-3
Purdue 15-5
Illinois 15-5
ILL 16-4 (Mich and their 14 wins and not playing 3 games can shove it LOL)
Wisc 14-6
MSU 16-4
MSU 16-2
Purdue 14-4
IU 15-3
So if we went 16-4, we would be winners in 6 or 7 of the last 10 years and within 1 game or less in all 10 years. So basically the vast majority of the time this teams performance would be a serious title contender and most likely a title winner.
15-5 wins a title or is 1 game back 6/10 years
Its just bc this particular year mihigan has gone nuclear
Plus we have had about 10 games missed by starters........i would bet with kylan we beat MSU and with kylan stoj we beat wisky. We very likely would have a "real shot" if inury free
And we STILL have a good shot at a 2 seed, and worst case is what? a 4? seems pretty close to your expectations
You nailed this. We were on the verge of blowing them out of the gym and he wanted to wait for tv timeouts.One of my things this season is Brad not calling timeouts … He just kind of sits back and tries to let them figure it out …
Let’s call a timeout … Let’s draw something up … We don’t have anything to draw up !!!!! It’s all matchups or whatever … And clearly it works overall … But when it’s not for stretches … We better have some dang plays !!!!
Little guards who are fast asand crafty … TORCHED US !!!!! ALL. YEAR. LONG. !!!!!! Philon, Boyd, Dent, Thornton, Reid at NW gave us 30, Smith gave us 27, Fears gave us 26 & 15 … I’m sure there’s more … Figure out an adjustment !!!!
Completely agree:
(1) Force the inbounds pass to one side of the floor,
(2) Stop the ball with a double. Meaning the player receiving the ball can't put it on the floor and his only pass is backwards.
A number of other posters caught this as well. You can't let the player drbble the ball - he has to pass it. We made the exact same mistake against Tennessee last season at home.
So you are in a front court press with 5 seconds left whether you are up by 1 or 2 points or down by 1 or 2 points. The strategy after that (whether you foul) depends on whether you are winning or losing.
What baffles me is that as good as this coaching staff is, I can't believe they don't practice that defense every day.
Despite what a lot of the stat/percentage quoting posters will say how good our fast break defense is, this team hasn’t stopped the ball handler well at all this entire season. After both misses and makes, our opponent’s ball handlers often penetrate beyond the top of the key and into the lane. It’s on film. No matter how elementary it is, this team’s tendencies are obvious and Cronin new he didn’t need to change the play after Brad’s time out bc it was their best opportunity.
A certain freshman unexpectedly having an All American type year reset expectations mid season. Give the coaching staff full credit for discovering Keaton. But his play has moved the perceived ceiling for the team way up. We only get one year with him, need to take advantage of it.
If I remember correctly Murray State should have beaten them in probably an opening round game.
I don't think your expectations were unreasonable. I mean shoot, the previous poster said you were irrational to think about a 1 seed, but we've been talking about for a couple months now. And I dont expect them to run the table, but if they do im not sure how they dont grab it.
My expectations were more tempered because of the unknowns. We lost 2 first round draft picks, Morez who is projected late 1st rounder this year, Tre White who is starting for the #16 team in the country, and brought in a lot of new pieces. It would have been hard for me to imagine Wagler and Mirkovic being this good on top of the turnaround Humrichous has showed. This team has come to gel really well.
Also not a fan of the injury excuses. Im not sure we win at Purdue with Boswell. With all due respect to him, his injury gave Wagler the chance to grow and I feel it will be better for us in the long run. Just be healthy come tourney time. We had healthy 2nd half leads in all our recent losses and blew it. They proved capable, the just blew it. Hopefully they learn.
Just want to point out that this logic is absurd lmao
"We're actually better if guys just get injured and don't play"
Lol Wait, so losing to UCLA after being up 23 was the biggest blown lead ever by an AP Top 10 team. So, if what you're saying is accurate, that means we were the previous record holder, too?
And people wonder why we're crazy.
Andrej needed to take away his right hand, and deter him to the corner.
Does Wagler go off the way he did? With Boswell back in the lineup, he’s had (relatively) less impactful performances (not saying he’s been bad by any means).Just want to point out that this logic is absurd lmao
"We're actually better if guys just get injured and don't play"
on the plus side, the guys did a really good job not fouling.
:/
Having our team whole and another guard to slow down Smith would have been the optimal way to have played that game
Taking away Kylan and then needing Keaton to go bananas and score 46 is a disadvantage, not the other way around
Since the big game against Purdue Wagler has been the focal point of our opponents defense. He is regularly trapped and double teamed making it much more difficult for him and he is not one to force the issue or get careless with the ball. There are sometimes he ends up in a bad situation because when he sees an opening he gets so much attention there is always someone coming to help on him if he does get a path to the basket. Fortunately we have a lot of other options on this team so he doesn't have to take 20 shots to contribute like a lot of other ball hogging gaurds out there playing me ball.
Feel like Kylan takes alot of not great 3 point shots.
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