Because they were pressing.
Yep. We looked sped up and uncomfortable from the tip. The threes Coleman was taking from the top of the key he always makes I could tell weren’t going in before they even left his hand because his entire rhythm was off.
Airballing layups. Missing free shots. Throwing the ball damn near over the backboard with wild shots. Going right at a guy who was taking our lunch money left and right and refusing to make adjustments.
Fought back and made it a game at half then inexplicably came out of the break with Rodgers on the floor again which allowed Clingan to clog the lane. Two minutes or so later we were cooked.
You absolutely cannot have a 6’7” guy who won’t even look at the basket running the point against a team like UConn. They didn’t even guard him unless he got inside 10’ and even when he did get to the rim I think he missed them all.
TSJ a total no-show, Castle matched up with him physically and with Clingan camping in the lane and no real motion going on for him when Clingan was out, he was fucked.
Even with all that said, the offense managed to get a TON of open looks, but we didn’t take a lot of them, and missed most of the ones we did. For as old as this team was, I wasn’t expecting them to wither under the bright lights the way they did.
Sucks, but still overperformed expectations for the season, scored a TOTTM banner, made second weekend, overperformed our seed for once in getting to an E8, and was one of the best 5-6 seasons Illinois basketball has had since the tourney expanded in 1975.
Was a fun ride this year and I’ll always wonder what could have been if we didn’t have the entire mid season TSJ debacle. If the team had continued to grow together rather than going through that train wreck, who knows what our ceiling would have been?
This run will give the program some ammo and NIL money to go out and reload. On the whole, it’s definitely a big step forward for the Underwood era and something to build on. I have thoroughly enjoyed being nationally relevant again.
LFG