Game Thread: Illinois vs. Northwestern
- Thread starter lou v
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That was like David vs Goliath last night. All we had was a little pea shooter.
Happy to see Collins mixing it up. Try something, try anything. What do we have to lose at this point? Lost season unless we find some combination that works.
We could play then ten times this year and I don’t think we one. Too much size and talent for us. Not to mention they are a lot older and mature. Men vs boys. We didn’t play poorly last night. Just a little outmatched.
The older semi-pros dominating some teams is an issue. Many prominent coaches are actively commenting in the media how it is having a negative impact on the younger players coming out of high school. Limits on age and number of foreign players on teams? Coaches are advocating for some kind of rules to deal with the current chaos and with some programs taking advantage by stocking their teams with older Euro semi-pro players.
Furthermore I have heard from an Illini alum that the ivisic brothers are TERRIBLE studebts. Like can’t hack college level courses. This model doesn’t work for NU.
This talk of pro euro teams is over blown. There aren’t collegiate euro teams like there are here. After their U18 clubs, they move on to private “pro” clubs. These guys mostly aren’t coming from high level Euro ball, they’re largely no different than recruiting a transfer off an American college team.
That’s not what I made of most of this. They are taller (tallest team in the nation) and stronger (see Boswell) so they rebounded better and got easy putbacks. Any opposing coach can see that our defense against the P&R still stinks so they went after that. They made more shots in the second half; I don’t think they adjusted better than us.
I never claimed we are in their league. I just don’t see athleticism most do. Boswell is strong and a heckeva player. The freshman guard is good too. The Euros are large and can shoot. They don’t scream athletic to me. Experienced good teams aren’t going to get run off the court.
I don’t think it will be pretty when we play them at their place. It never is but could be looking at a 30 point drubbing if last night was a close 11.
1.3K views · 44 reactions | I asked Tomislav Ivisic about earning redemption from last season's overtime loss at Northwestern. He says they tried to be aware of how last year's second half played out, knowing that they could come back at any time.
I asked Tomislav Ivisic about earning redemption from last season's overtime loss at Northwestern. He says they tried to be aware of how last year's second half played out, knowing that they could...
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Could be a language barrier. Illini need to hire interpreters who speak Serbian and Croatian.