College Basketball 2024-2025

[mul21]

14 hours ago, gflore34 said:

True that, I’ve a feeling the success of this season will not sustained by May.  He’s got a great combination in Wolf and Goldin something of which he’ll never have again.  Maybe, the Illini are getting healthier, Ivisic is looking better.  Hopefully, the regress to mean game from 3 is coming, be nice if it comes vs. Purdue.

Yeah, looking back on a few of those games during the rough stretch they had you can absolutely tell they were dead from illness and injury.  The effort has been much better, especially on defense and in the rebounding department the last couple games, plus the fact that Underwood wasn't losing his mind because of it tells me there was something else there he knew wasn't an effort based issue as it appeared from the outside.  I kinda hope they get like a 6 or 7 seed because that makes the path to advancing past the first weekend much more palatable.

[gflore34]

1 hour ago, mul21 said:

Yeah, looking back on a few of those games during the rough stretch they had you can absolutely tell they were dead from illness and injury.  The effort has been much better, especially on defense and in the rebounding department the last couple games, plus the fact that Underwood wasn't losing his mind because of it tells me there was something else there he knew wasn't an effort based issue as it appeared from the outside.  I kinda hope they get like a 6 or 7 seed because that makes the path to advancing past the first weekend much more palatable.

Helps they've another long break between games, don't play again until Friday.  Underwood mentioned they've been able to have full practices again, I have to think we'll see better basketball from a very capable team.

[Irrelevant Dude]

Illinois on the 7/10 or 8/9 line is going to be a team that simultaneously:

• is a popular pick to lose in the first round
• is a scary team that could be a dark horse for the Sweet 16 and/or Final Four

[gflore34]

59 minutes ago, Irrelevant Dude said:

Illinois on the 7/10 or 8/9 line is going to be a team that simultaneously:

• is a popular pick to lose in the first round
• is a scary team that could be a dark horse for the Sweet 16 and/or Final Four

I'm guessing far more of the first option than second, Duke game is probably still fresh in most minds.  That's okay, no expectations, no pressure, ultimately, all depends on the match-ups, with favorable match-ups we may see them make a run.

[mul21]

30 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

I'm guessing far more of the first option than second, Duke game is probably still fresh in most minds.  That's okay, no expectations, no pressure, ultimately, all depends on the match-ups, with favorable match-ups we may see them make a run.

I think a lot depends on how healthy/effective Morez will be.  They just don't have enough inside without him playing big minutes and taking some of the pressure off Ivisic.  If he's back and at 85-90% of what he was before the injury, I think there's a much better chance of them surprising people.

[gflore34]

Saw Kansas lose last night, they're 19-11 overall, have not been following, is their situation similar to the Illini?  Illness and injuries really taking a toll on their season?

[mul21]

35 minutes ago, gflore34 said:

Saw Kansas lose last night, they're 19-11 overall, have not been following, is their situation similar to the Illini?  Illness and injuries really taking a toll on their season?

I have a friend who's a big Kansas fan and he's been frustrated with them all season.  Just a bunch of guys that don't really fit together.  I'm kinda glad Storr decided to go there instead because he seems like a guy who just makes teams fall short of their potential.

[InSeungHo]

The Illini are definitely playing much better these last three games. 

[gflore34]

Illini finally put a pin in Purdue' series winning streak, didn't hurt they got a make up phantom foul on White's 3-pt play.  Of course, earlier in the game, Jakucionis was called for a phantom foul on Smith' (maybe it was Loyer') 3 attempt.  Johnson possibly being back would be huge for them, think he would have made a big difference tonight.

Edited March 8, 2025 by gflore34

[scarey]

I've never wanted a first game loss in a Big Ten tournament so badly for the Boilermakers. This turned out to be the rebuild year I originally expected it to be, but I'm still hoping for a fun run in the tournament.

[javy knows my name]

horsefeathers, you guys beat Purdue. That was one of our best wins. 

[gflore34]

MSU looking good early vs U of M, I’d like to see what a healthy Illini team could do to MSU.  Maybe, we’ll get a chance in the BTT,  The Illini win vs Purdue, one of the handful of times Underwood out-coached an opposing coach, kept doubling of Kaufman-Renn in his pocket until the end.  Then sprang on Purdue and threw them off enough to make a difference.

[gflore34]

Wolf and Goldin are great but, on the whole, U of M’s back court is for horsefeathers.

[UMFan83]

1 hour ago, gflore34 said:

Wolf and Goldin are great but, on the whole, U of M’s back court is for horsefeathers.

what a horsefeathers collapse the last half of the season.  Haven't won a game by more than 4 points since early January are a 2 plays away from a 6 game losing streak to end the season.  When Michigan was great they were dominating with Wolf and Goldin...once teams started packing the paint and daring Michigan's guards to shoot every shooter fell off a cliff.  Might be a short tourney trip for them.  Good season though coming off an 8 win disaster I suppose.

[Rex Buckingham]

May is a good coach. Will be interesting to see how their roster is rebuilt

[Ding Dong Johnson]

Hey Iowa made the tourney. Woo?

[bukie]

6 minutes ago, Ding Dong Johnson said:

Hey Iowa made the tourney. Woo?

Well, a tourney.

Meanwhile Nebraska went from safely into the NCAA tourney to not qualifying for the B1G tourney in 5 games. Ouch.

[Derwood]

Penn State went from 10-1 to 16-15

[soccer10k]

The Sun Belt has the weirdest tournament format I’ve seen. There are 14 teams but only 4 teams play each round. So this year, for example, Marshall was the 11 seed so they played in the first round. They won 4 games before finally losing their fifth game, which was somehow only the quarterfinals.

EDIT: Apparently the Marshall thing was on the women’s side but the bracket is the same.

Edited March 10, 2025 by soccer10k

[bukie]

1 hour ago, soccer10k said:

The Sun Belt has the weirdest tournament format I’ve seen. There are 14 teams but only 4 teams play each round. So this year, for example, Marshall was the 11 seed so they played in the first round. They won 4 games before finally losing their fifth game, which was somehow only the quarterfinals.

On the men's side, the top 2 seeds got quintuple byes in the conference tournament and neither advanced to the final.

[soccer10k]

It's 11 p.m. local time in Tennessee and they just started the second half of an SEC tournament game. As if that wasn't bad enough, it's after midnight in New York and they're still playing a Big East tournament game.

Have these things always run this late and I don't remember it?

Edited March 14, 2025 by soccer10k

[mul21]

9 hours ago, soccer10k said:

It's 11 p.m. local time in Tennessee and they just started the second half of an SEC tournament game. As if that wasn't bad enough, it's after midnight in New York and they're still playing a Big East tournament game.

Have these things always run this late and I don't remember it?

I was thinking the same thing last night as I watched the end of the USC Purdue game a little after 10:00.  I feel like the Big East has always run a little late but that seemed later than usual last night, possibly because of the DePaul OT game though.

[mul21]

Some fun games yesterday and I can't tell you how much I absolutely love the quad screen YouTube TV has.  I was a little disappointed I couldn't get the exact mix I was looking for on it but overall it's awesome.  Illinois looks so much better right now but I think this game against Maryland is a big ask with Morez at maybe 80%.

[Sosa21MVP]

@UMFan83 The Wolverines seem to have their mojo back! 

[gflore34]

U of M turned it around within a week, back court finally kicked in for them.  We’ll see their draw, maybe, it’ll be good.  I know the Illini will get horsefeathered over.