IlliniHQ 2
General Category => Fighting Illini Basketball Forum => Topic started by: Lkdog on April 07, 2026, 01:42:06 AM
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https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7177055/2026/04/06/mens-college-basketball-2026-early-top-25-rankings/ (https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7177055/2026/04/06/mens-college-basketball-2026-early-top-25-rankings/)
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https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7177055/2026/04/06/mens-college-basketball-2026-early-top-25-rankings/ (https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7177055/2026/04/06/mens-college-basketball-2026-early-top-25-rankings/)
That Top 10 has some HUGE ????
I like it for sure, don't get me wrong, but if some of those teams don't find "KEY" missing pieces, they won't be in that list very long at all.
I think ILLINOIS only needs to hang on the frontcourt players, I actually like our chances with Morillo/Coleman with the frontcourt of Mirk/Ivisic's/with Rodgers and Andrej on the wings. Really all we gotta do is bag a huge player like Blackwell or similar in quality and maybe 1 more really good inside/out player along the lines of Humrichous.
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gotta love rankings before 75% of players switch teams lol
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As far as the ILLINI go, I would suspect the focus is going to be on athletic transitional pieces...wings/forwards and such.
I mean we will have about what 18-20 rumored mil to spend for retention and new gets? If we can capture all the top 4 components back, I think we would be fine with Coleman coming in to take over with where Keaton left us off at...I mean other than 6'4 vs 6'6, they have very similar games, EXCEPT I really think Coleman's dog mentality is a little more upfront than Keaton's was. Either is not a bad thing.
Stoyakovic - 2/3 mil
Ivisic's combined 4/5 mil
Mirkovic - 3 mil
Davis - 1 m.
Rodgers - ??
That's 12 million to keep the key pieces. Blackwell will be another 2/3 million (assumed the fit is right), Coleman probably 1.5, Morillo 1, Brown/Davis 500,00 redshirt potential with our depth.
So if those are even remotely close. We will have spent 18.5 but I would suspect we could spend upwards to 20 if we had too. Not sure we have too.