Welp, it had to happen eventually. Games like this are
familiar and uncomfortable for so many reasons. For the first time all year, we
couldn’t shoot ourselves out of a tough matchup. Once again, we failed to
exploit our size advantage down low (we did OK the first ten minutes). For the
first time all year, Harris seemed to disappear. Once again, a hot three point
shooting team lit us up. For the first time all year, our turnovers really
caught up to us, and we couldn’t counter that with our offensive rebounding
advantage. Once again, a tweener type, 6’5” – 6’8,” who can shoot and attack
off the dribble absolutely crushed us and we had no answers. Rough night, but
enough of our team’s issues came to a head that it was, in some ways,
inevitable.
I’d be lying to you if I said that I saw this coming. I didn’t.
While I was aware of Brandon Paul’s skillset, the deep stable of hot shooting
guards, and the general talent at Illinois, I thought all of that would be
negated by our size in the paint and our backcourt's ability to stay in front of
shooters. For the first 15 minutes of the game, I felt vindicated. Olynyk and
Harris were scoring at will. Karnowski played well. Illinois had no answer for
our big men and Paul started creeping away from his man beyond the three point
line to block shots from behind (an athletic play, but the kind of thing that
can get you in trouble against a smart team). This game got away from us
because we turned the ball over in the first half, went to a 3-2 zone
occasionally (giving them their first easy buckets of the game and getting
their offense in gear), and our backcourt missed a TON of open threes. That’s
not exactly a formula for success.
Twelve turnovers in the first half! Illinois had 5 (I
believe, I don’t feel like looking at the box score right now), but managed to
score 20 points off of our turnovers. If you had told me pregame that we would
have 12 turnovers and we went into halftime tied at 41… well, I would have said
something like: “shit, that sounds crazy.” Illinois did a good job playing
aggressive defense on our guards, but many of the turnovers were from lazy
passing or bad hands by Karnowski, Olynyk, and Harris. They have to get better
at catching the ball in traffic and kicking the ball out if the shot isn’t
there.
Positives:
Olynyk kept us in the game for a stretch, shooting very well
and generally being a productive player despite his turnover problems. He shot
7-9 from the field and was aggressive, which is nice. Gary Bell started out aggressive
and went after his shot, which I absolutely loved. We need more of that from
him. He fought his way into the lane and hit a couple tough floaters. That
aggressiveness waned later on, but he was the only guard I was comfortable with
shooting the ball all game. Harris was great early but he disappeared over the
course of the game as the Zag backcourt failed to get him the ball
consistently. When he had the ball, he did some good things, but the team didn’t
scheme properly to get him involved. He’s a Wooden candidate people, this stuff
isn’t that hard.
Negatives:
Allllll sorts of stuff here, but I’ll keep it brief. Pangos
was awful. Probably should have been benched… just absolutely no flow to his
game, not great on defense, and generally just off. Having Stockton on your
bench allows you to bench your star guard if he isn’t playing well but Few
thought otherwise, probably because Stockton’s late rotations led to 2-3 three
pointers. Hmm… what else? Karnowski looked lost on D, but was very effective on
offense. I think against a team like Illinois Few decided that Karnowski couldn’t
chase a faster forward around, which is probably accurate. Brandon Paul had 35 (!) points against a variety of defenders, but definitely had his fair share of wide open shots. At some point, the coaching staff has to figure out how to shut someone down when they're going crazy like that. I don't know, double teams? Hard hedging after a ball screen to get the ball out of his hands? Something.
I put most of this loss on Coach Few, which seems like an
easy cop out, but I think it’s pretty clear. Switching from man defense to a
3-2 zone gave Illinois 6 quick points (on an open 3 and a layup/foul shot) that
absolutely put a dent in our early aggressive demeanor. For whatever reason,
our scouting reports failed to pick up on the fact that the 3 point shot is the
focal point of the Illini offense. Against a team like this, you should never go underneath a screen on the
three point line, but every one of our guards did this at multiple points in
the game. How does Few not make this a point of emphasis before the game? An
open three point shot is the ideal
result of an offensive possession for their team, meaning that guards should
fight over or through screens, rather than give up the long distance shot. Inexcusable.
Rough night, but an opportunity for growth nonetheless.
Hopefully, Coach Few uses this loss to hammer home more defensive principles
and show that despite our high octane (usually) offense, we can’t shoot our way
out of everything. There are plenty of teams that can shoot with us, but few
who can hang with us in the post, and I’m sure all of those entry pass
turnovers will be shown on repeat for the next few days. Tough loss! But early season
losses can galvanize a team to fix weaknesses and evolve together. Let’s see if
that happens.
