Illini Basketball 2024-2025

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#176      
Homecoming 2019
and 69 others said:
With that hair, shouldn’t it say, “Meet the Newcomber”?
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#179      
IllinoisssssssVarsity
#182      
Joel Goodson
#184      
Fly Illini Fly!
Combo said:
At #19 our highest rated since Dee (#19 also?). What's crazy is Duke has #s 1, 4, 13, 17, and 19. And they do that year after year. If Wonder Boy happens to get them to the EE, everyone will be saying what an amazing job he did.
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I believe it was Rivals that had Dee at 19. Rivals has Riley at 12.

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#187      
Bert2022
Dan said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1810827177648066852
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I have to say....out of all the amazing media that the men's basketball program puts out....this has been my least favorite series...kinda a head scratcher....."meet the newcomer," really? They have all been a 5-7 second poorly shot snippet of action for each of these. Changing the title might help lower the expectation a bit, but at the end of the day, it is less than spectacular and inconsistent with all of the incredible content they provide.
 
#188      
pruman91

Bear with me my brothers and sisters , I fell a couple of weeks ago and now need crutches to get around......heavily medded up and surviving the pain...................it's still great to be an Illini fanatic ;........IT REALLY REALLY REALLY IS..............Carry on my wayward souls..........

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#190      
HensonHall71
Combo said:
From the highlights I've seen he doesn't look particularly agile. I love us getting him as he's certainly a good shooter and looks to be a good passer also. And he's 7 ft tall and not a skinny kid that needs strength. But I don't think he's that athletic.
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To be fair - if he was super athletic, he'd be playing in the NBA right now at 21 y.o. There is a reason he was still available- but he's a 7 footer that has a really good stroke from 3 that will stretch the floor, he seems to be a good passer with good awareness and he's physical enough to play in the big ten right now - I think he'll be a really good college player for us
 
#191      
Brosky
There's a great article about current practices today in the summer workouts in the N-G.. BU is strongly emphasizing speed and 3 pt. shooting. Most of the scrimmages are 3 on 3, with a fast shot clock, sometimes as low as 14 seconds. He wants considerably more three point attempts than last year. And why not? Boswell's career pct. is 38%, same as Davis and KJ (I'm rounding). Ben shot 41% at Evansville last season and Ivisic at 42% for his career. BU really wants to "spread the floor and open up the paint." It's not in the article but we know Booth can shoot the three also. It sounds like he and Ben are classic stretch fours. DGL can shoot the three. White is a threat from distance as well, although not as well as these other guys. Still, you have to guard him closely on the perimeter. This model, of course, leaves Rodgers on the bench, but I'm sure he'll get a good share of minutes. No mention of Riley in the article. He's a true freshman. I would love to see the energy of these scrimmages and the combinations that get put together.
 
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#192      
illini12345
Any general updates on how the guys look at practice? Last we've heard KJ is a star, Boswell has had early struggles, and Hum/Ty/Tre have all been at or around what we've expected
 
#193      
Brosky
HensonHall71 said:
To be fair - if he was super athletic, he'd be playing in the NBA right now at 21 y.o. There is a reason he was still available- but he's a 7 footer that has a really good stroke from 3 that will stretch the floor, he seems to be a good passer with good awareness and he's physical enough to play in the big ten right now - I think he'll be a really good college player for us
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Agree. 100%. And I expect him to be a strong post defender.
 
#194      
uofi7477
pruman91 said:

Bear with me my brothers and sisters , I fell a couple of weeks ago and now need crutches to get around......heavily medded up and surviving the pain...................it's still great to be an Illini fanatic ;........IT REALLY REALLY REALLY IS..............Carry on my wayward souls..........

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Geez Pru - no fun. Heal quickly...
 
#195      
Combo
HensonHall71 said:
To be fair - if he was super athletic, he'd be playing in the NBA right now at 21 y.o. There is a reason he was still available- but he's a 7 footer that has a really good stroke from 3 that will stretch the floor, he seems to be a good passer with good awareness and he's physical enough to play in the big ten right now - I think he'll be a really good college player for us
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I agree.
 
#197      
Fighter of the Nightman
Slow day for me at work ... and I was thinking how wild this would have been to tell my dad or something 30+ years ago that one day Illinois would play the following programs in one regular season. I know it is partially due to realignment, but just from a historical prestige perspective, this is wild that we are getting this many historically relevant(ish) programs that were not in the pre-PSU Big Ten:

UCLA in Champaign
Duke at MSG
Arkansas in Kansas City
Maryland in Champaign
Alabama in Birmingham
Tennessee in Champaign
Missouri in St. Louis

This is obviously in addition to historically great programs like MSU (x2), Indiana in Bloomington, Purdue in Champaign, etc. I think realignment sucks as much as anyone, but the combination of that plus our aggressive/awesome non-conference scheduling has given us a ridiculous schedule this year from a historical perspective. For reference, this is our schedule laid out in terms of where programs rank in the "all-time top 35" (link) for AP Poll appearances. (FTR, we are #10 all-time.)

vs. #3 Duke (New York, NY)
vs. #5 UCLA
at #8 Indiana
vs. #11 Michigan State
at #11 Michigan State
vs. #12 Ohio State
vs. #14 Maryland
at #14 Michigan (yes, they're tied with Maryland)
vs. #17 Purdue
vs. #21 Iowa
vs. #24 Tennessee
vs. #25 Alabama (Birmingham, AL)
vs. #31 Wisconsin
at #31 Wisconsin
vs. #32 Missouri (St. Louis, MO)
vs. #34 Arkansas (Kansas City, MO)

And just for fun, remaining Big Ten schools' rankings:

#42 Minnesota
#48 USC
#56 Washington
#59 Oregon
#112 Rutgers
#114 Nebraska
#123 Penn State
... DRUM ROLL ...
#139 Northwestern at 18 weeks or 1.4% of all weeks since the poll started. :cool:
 
#199      
Illwinsagain
I wonder if they ever let the players do a "pick-em" game. Have the point guards pick their own team and go at it. Then let Ty and Tre do it. It would let the coaching staff see who the players think are the best and also, who they are most comfortable playing with, style wise.
 
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