Thank You Seniors - Illini Pound UNLV

Well, I was half-right - UNLV did score 62 points on Friday night. But the Illini, led by Demetri McCamey and Mike Davis, dominated the Runnin' Rebels, putting up a lot more points than I expected in a not-as-close-as-the-final-score-indicated 73-62 win. I loved seeing the Illini beating the UNLV press consistently, resulting in a lot of easy fast-break buckets, as well as seeing DJ Richardson re-emerge, and Crandall Head and Meyers Leonard contribute.

A hearty Mazel Tov to Bruce Weber, who has finally won a tournament game at Illinois with his own players, and to the seniors, who won't have to wear the scarlet number "zero" (number of tournament wins) for the rest of their lives. And one more important fact - for only the second time since the NCAA tournament began seeding teams, the Illini beat a higher-seeded team.

The hill gets awfully steep in the next round. To have a chance to beat Kansas, Illinois will have to play the entire game like they played in the first half against UNLV. But for now, let's just enjoy this win.

OSKEE-WOW-WOW!

One Very Last Chance - Illinois vs. UNLV Preview

Last week, I wrote that the Big Ten tournament gave the Illinois senior class a chance to clean the slate and re-write their legacy. Of course, not only did they fail to clean the slate, but by staging a late-game collapse against Michigan they pretty much wrote the same legacy in permanent marker. However, the NCAA Tournament's selection committee was generous - by placing Illinois against #8 seed UNLV, they gave the Illini a fairly even shot to win their opening round game. The last group of 4-year players at Illinois to not win an NCAA tournament game graduated in 1980. Can this year's seniors take advantage of their chance to avoid that fate?

What to expect
Some things that jump out from looking at the profiles of UNLV and Illinois:

Both teams play tough defense, which isn't surprising considering who the coaches are. Lon Kruger's UNLV squad is 15th in the nation in defensive efficiency rating, while Bruce Weber's Illini are 23rd. The two teams are virtually identical in effective field goal percentage defense - UNLV is 26th in the nation; Illinois is a hair behind (27th). One red flag - UNLV is 17th in the nation in turnover percentage, but Illinois is 259th. This may give the Runnin' Rebels an edge by allowing them to pick up some easy points, which could be crucial in a game in which points will likely be hard to come by.

On offense, the teams couldn't be more different. Illinois, for better or worse, is a team that relies on jump-shooting. This results in the team not getting many opportunities at the foul line - the Illini are 334th (out of 345 teams) in the country in percentage of points per game from free throws. UNLV is pretty much the opposite of Illinois. They don't rely on perimeter shooting, as they are only 276th in the country in percentage points received from 3-point shots. However, they do get to the foul line significantly more often than Illinois does, and again, in a close game with tough defense those easy points could become a factor.

How I see it
The good news - I don't think we'll see a late-game collapse like in last week's Michigan game. The bad news - that's because I don't think Illinois will be able to pull away from UNLV for long enough to build a twelve-point lead. This one could very well shape up like the Illini's game at East Lansing last month. That was a tight game throughout, with neither team getting a significant advantage at any point, and the game was tied with four minutes left. But in those final minutes, Michigan State made plays, Illinois didn't, and the Spartans won.

I see a similar flow to this one, with the game being within one possession or even tied coming out of the final TV timeout. Unfortunately, at that point the Illini will go into one of their patented offensive dry spells while UNLV will make enough plays, including drawing a few fouls and sinking some key free throws, to survive and advance. And, sadly, our NCAA tournament drought will reach five years.

UNLV 62

Illini 57

Beep, Beep, Beep - Illini Back Their Way into NCAA Tournament

I've got to hand it to Bruce Weber - he's brought excitement back to Illini basketball. No, not on the court excitement - the team is as painful to watch as ever, and their offense in the final minutes of a game still runs like a clogged toilet. I'm talking about Selection Sunday excitement: being on the bubble, not knowing if/when we'll see our team's name displayed, watching half the brackets go by before finally getting the word that we've made the NCAA Tournament. That sure gets the blood pumping and the endorphins racing!

It's nice to know that a team with a .500 conference record, a team that didn't win back-to-back games even once over the final two months of the season, and a team that lost its conference tournament opener after blowing a 12-point lead (yes - this all refers to the same team) can not only "earn" a bid to the NCAA Tournament, but can get a #9 seed and avoid one of the new "play-in" games. So thanks to a really soft bubble and that win over North Carolina in November, I guess Ron Guenther has an excuse to not fire Bruce Weber. In fact, we can probably look forward to Weber getting a raise and/or contract extension for his "accomplishments" after this season ends.

As for the game itself, I'll have a preview of the UNLV Runnin' Rebels later, since I'll admit that I don't know too much about them. What I do know is that in the coaching department, the Illini will be at a severe disadvantage going up against Lon Kruger. I think a paraphrase of James T. Smith says it best: pitting Weber's coaching skills against Kruger's is like going against an army with a handgun. At least we won't be playing a true road game in the NIT like last year, and we'll have a chance to end our five-year NCAA tournament victory drought.

Illini Basketball - Marginally Relevant since 2006!