Game Preview: Gophers vs. Illinois Fighting Illini

Illinois is an awfully tough team to figure out.  On one hand, they're ranked just 34th at kenpom.com using his advanced stats, so you'd tend to think the 14-2 start was a bit fluky and dismiss them as pretenders.  On the other hand, however, they just spanked Ohio State by almost 20 (an overrated Ohio State, but still) and already own a road win at Gonzaga by double digits and a neutral site win over Butler by nearly 20.  Those are not three wins a fluky team should have.  Their losses (to Missouri on a neutral court and @ Purdue) are both acceptable as well.  No clue what to make of these guys.

One thing is for certain, they're already better off than the last several seasons since they finally jettisoned world's worst coach Bruce Weber and, with Tracey Abrams emergence, they actually have a viable point guard for the first time since the good ole days of Chester Frazier.  Perhaps the best thing about Abrams is that he's allowed Brandon Paul to spend more time off the ball where he's more of a natural, and it's showed as Paul has blossomed into maybe the second best scorer in the league behind DeShaun Thomas.  Paul has always had a tendency to fall a bit too in love with the 3 (which seems to be Illinois' mantra this year - more on that in a minute) but can score from anywhere and excels getting to the rim.  His numbers are up across the board this year and is the best perimeter players the Gophers have faced this season.  If Austin Hollins is going to be the defensive stopper we think he is (and I think he is) this is his big test to prove it.

Paul is certainly a concern for the Gophers, but the entire Illinois team is dangerous because they've simply fallen completely in love with the three-pointer.  They shoot an absolute ton of them (43% of their FG attempts come behind the line - 15th in the country) and make a whole bunch (hitting 36% on the year).  For most of the year I figured this was totally a fluke since they were a terrible shooting team last year (just 30% from three, one of the worst marks in the nation) and it's pretty close to the same team.  It's been going on a bit too long to be a total fluke, however, so perhaps there's an alternative explanation.  Much as how a great coach can make his players better, perhaps a horrendous coach can suppress such simple skills as jump shooting.  Much like the West Canaan Coyotes truly blossomed as a team after Coach Bud Kilmer was forced out, perhaps too these Illini merely needed to cast out Bruce Weber to suddenly all become marksmen from deep.

I don't really know the reason, but suddenly all five major contributors have turned into Ray Allen.  Paul has increased a bit but you could attribute that to playing more off the ball and the "senior step up", and D.J. Richardson is actually a little bit worse, but Abrams (from 26% to 32%), Tyler Griffey (from 29% to 41%) and Joseph Bertrand (from 30% to 44%) all made the Moxon leap.  Can they keep this up?  Really, it depends on if you believe in the Varsity Blues theory, and that's also what's going to swing this game.  The Gophers defend the three pretty well, and the other team they played that shot a lot of them at a high percentage (Richmond) they held to 4-20 shooting.

And yet Richmond is not West Canaan (more like Bainville, am I right?), and Illinois is clearly better and almost everything than Richmond.  The Gophers are much better than Illinois in pretty much every way, and the Gophers are going to absolutely destroy them on the boards.  There's no reason for the Gophers to lose this game, except that Illinois' big strength is what they like to call "the great equalizer" (no, not Lincoln).  Illinois is going to shoot a lot of threes, and probably hit a lot of threes.  Can the Gophers limit that?  Can the Gophers grab 75% of their misses (they get 49.7% on the season, Illinois allows 34% - that's really bad) and just keep scoring every trip down the court?  Who wins the turnover battle?

It all comes down to what you believe.  There's the theory that the Gophers are a Final Four team.  Then there's the theory (not directly competing but you know) that Illinois is the Varsity Blues team, and they won the title.  IT ALL COMES DOWN TO WHAT YOU BELIEVE.

Minnesota 73, Illinois 68.

Yep.

Gopher/Illinois Preview

I don't really want to preview this game, mostly because the two teams are pretty much unpredictable and wildly inconsistent. I read the previews at From the Barn and The Fourth Strike (newer Blogger who tackles the Twins and Gophers - big fan) and neither of them inspired me much for the same reason - nobody has a clue what is going to happen tonight.

I won't go into the Gopher inconsistencies, as I'm sure you are all too familiar with them, but instead take a quick look at the Illini.

Much the Gophers, part of the Illini's issues stem from an offensively challenged point guard, in this case Chester Frazier. He handles the point guard duties just fine, running the offense, getting his teammates the ball (leads the Big Ten at 5.4 assists per game), and taking care of the basketball (respectable 2.5-1 assist/to ratio). He just struggles with the scoring of the basketball. He shoots just 45% from the field and 38% from three, and even sadder, those are career bests. He's a steady point guard and is tough to keep from getting into the lane, but if the Gophers can limit his ability to find his teammates and force him to become a big part of the offense, it will go a long way towards a win.

Of course, Frazier doesn't score much because he doesn't need to. The Illini have four players averaging in double figures, and they do it from the outside (Demetri McCamey 11.9, Trent Meachem 10.2) and the inside (Mike Davis 11.0, Mike Tisdale 10.9). The Gophers were able to hold Illinois to just 36 points in their last meeting due to some tenacious defense. Sampson and Iverson out muscled the Illini big men all game, which led to a 40-26 rebounding advantage and Tisdale/Davis combining for just four points on 2-11 shooting. The held Illinois on the perimeter (McCamey/Meachem 13 points on 5-16 shooting) by playing tough, hard-nosed, no frills, big pressure defense. They were up in the Illini's shorts all game, in one of the most impressive defensive games I've seen out of any body.

Of course, that defense has seemingly disappeared since that game. Sure, the defensive effort against Northwestern was solid, but that's a whole different team. If they want a chance to win, they will need to at least come close to replicating that kind of defensive game, because chances are Illinois won't let them score too many points.

Oh yeah, besides all that offensive firepower (when it shows up) the Illini are the 6th best defensive team in the country based on defensive efficiency. They also only let their opposition shoot 29% from three point land, which is fifth in the nation, and just 44% from 2, also in the top 100.

Can the Gophers win? Yes. Two things need to happen:

1. Defensive effort. It's been missing since the last time these two teams played, but we know the Gophers are capable of it. I'm not saying they need to hold Illinois to under 30% shooting and majorly outrebound them again, although that would be nice, but the effort has to be there. From the previous Gopher game and the Penn State game, we know the Illini can be held down. Forget the press (their guards are too good anyway), forget the zone, just hard-nosed, tough man-to-man. Of course, in the game the Gophers won, they had only 10 total fouls called on them despite playing the in-you-face pressure man-to-man - I don't the refs are that forgiving in Champaign.

2. Forget the damn three pointer. Unless you're wide open. Stop with the passing around the perimeter all day long. Illinois is way too good of a defensive team to lose against the offense the Gophers have been running the last few games. Things were looking better against Northwestern, but that same aggressiveness has to continue through to this game. As your girlfriend said to me last night, "Penetration is the key."


So that's what needs to happen, but it won't. Even if they break out the pressure man-to-man, the refs are going to end up hamstringing them since they're the road team. And I have no confidence that will happen at all. McCamey and Meachem both get hot, and Tisdale kills inside. Illinois 73, Minnesota 55.

*****UNKNOWN AWESOME PLAYER ALERT*****

While learning just how awful Hawaii is at defense, taking care of the basketball, and shooting while they get worked over by the not as good as you think Illini, I discovered an unknown gem in the Rainbow's 6-7 Junior forward Roderick Flemings. In addition to have a sweet name, he posses a good jumpshot, an insane vertical, good ball handling skills, and a nice mid-range game including a turnaround jumper from about 12 feet. As an added bonus, he's lefthanded.

He reminds me a bit of Hakim Warrick, which sounds silly until you look at both his stats and his pedigree. This is his first year with Hawaii after transferring from JuCo, but he did play his freshman year for Oklahoma State, where he averaged 3 points and 2 rebounds per game in 11 minutes - signing there after being given four stars by Scout.com and ranked as the #10 small forward in the country. Things didn't work out and he ended up at a Texas JuCo where he averaged 21 points and 12 rebounds per game and signed with Hawaii despite being offered by Georgetown, UCONN, Kentucky, Texas A&M, West Virginia, and Arkansas.

He's made an immediate impact, needed badly on a team that lost seven seniors, leading the team in scoring (17.0) and steals (1.4) and second in rebounding (7.2) and assists (2.2), while shooting 47%. He had a double-double in his previous game in against Prairie View with 22 and 13, and has already done it against the Illini with 11 points and 10 rebounds as I type this, with 11 minutes remaining in the game.

The rest of the Rainbows suck worse than the name the Rainbows, so this information probably won't help you in any way whatsoever, but if you do hear about him for some reason, just remember you heard it here first.

Some info that might help you, however, is that Chester Frazier of the Illini is 4-6 on threes tonight, and looks like he might finally have learned how to shoot. He's shooting 33% so far this year, which, sadly, is a career high. Not that I'm particularly worried about Illinois or Frazier, but one less weapon for a Big Ten team is always a good thing.