For the first time in what seems like months, we finally got to see the first 5 minutes of an Illini game on Sunday. Illinois played a great game against Purdue, and I know that Robbie Hummel did not play, but a win is a win, and we needed this one. With Illinois' win, they swept the season series from the a team that most predicted would win the Big Ten. A lot of great things happened in this game, so lets hop on the good foot and do the bad thing!!
- First it is really annoying when you follow a team for an entire year, and then you have to listen to the likes of Doris Burke, or in the case of this game, Vern Lundquist announce the game with no prior knowledge of the teams they are covering. For Purdue fans this game must have been one of the worst experiences that they have had to drink themselves through in a long time. Not only do you never lead in the game, play without Robbie Hummel for the second straight game, but you have to listen to Vern create a new player called Keaton Moore. After watching the game a couple times, I'm pretty sure that Vern was referring to Keaton Grant, but he sounded so old and senile during the game that he could very well have been replaying a 1986 Australian Open tennis match in his head. For the record "Keaton Moore", Keaton Grant, and E'Twan Moore all played like shit.
- First it is really annoying when you follow a team for an entire year, and then you have to listen to the likes of Doris Burke, or in the case of this game, Vern Lundquist announce the game with no prior knowledge of the teams they are covering. For Purdue fans this game must have been one of the worst experiences that they have had to drink themselves through in a long time. Not only do you never lead in the game, play without Robbie Hummel for the second straight game, but you have to listen to Vern create a new player called Keaton Moore. After watching the game a couple times, I'm pretty sure that Vern was referring to Keaton Grant, but he sounded so old and senile during the game that he could very well have been replaying a 1986 Australian Open tennis match in his head. For the record "Keaton Moore", Keaton Grant, and E'Twan Moore all played like shit.
Also Greg Anthony kept mentioning how Bruce Weber and Matt Painter were greatly influenced by Bobby Knight. What? He didn't mention Gene Keady once, but refered to Knight 3 times. Other than being Big Ten coaches and being white, I'm not sure that you can draw too many other parallels between the 2.
- I was about to go back and look at the play-by-play for every game to see if Demitri McCamey has taken the first shot in all of them, but contrary to popular belief I don't have that much time on my hands, and I am not that insane. That being said, I think it is safe to say that Demitri leads the NCAA in "first shot" taking, although this game it wasn't a 3.
- Mike Tisdale has officially not shown up at the start of the last 3 games. He got yanked after 1:57 in this game after getting burned baseline, then not denying the ball in the post, then not blocking out, then fouling after not blocking out. Not a great start. On the bright side, Dominique Keller came in for him and promptly scored 6 points. Even Keller's missed lay-in and dunk looked goofy as hell. It makes me wonder if he does everything in his life abnormally. Does he brush his teeth by moving his head up and down, and back and forth? Does he have to sit down to tie his shoes so he doesn't fall down? Does he hang his shoes up in his closet, and place his shirts and pants on the ground? Maybe Dominique isn't only changing the fundamentals of basketball, but also life? Somebody needs to follow his everyday activities and report back, because his unorthodox style is definitely efficient on the court, maybe he is on to something in everyday situations as well.
- So Mike Davis not only has Tonsillitis, but he also has Bell's Palsy which is a paralysis of the face. I can't believe how well he is playing with both of the afflictions. He was an absolute monster on the boards, and made great jump shot after great jump shot! Also I am loving the Tisdale to Davis alley-oops that we have been seeing in the last few games. I still don't know how Davis caught the lob in this game and threw it down. On the flip side though, I don't know how he rim checked himself on a wide open dunk under the hoop.
- Mike Tisdale has officially not shown up at the start of the last 3 games. He got yanked after 1:57 in this game after getting burned baseline, then not denying the ball in the post, then not blocking out, then fouling after not blocking out. Not a great start. On the bright side, Dominique Keller came in for him and promptly scored 6 points. Even Keller's missed lay-in and dunk looked goofy as hell. It makes me wonder if he does everything in his life abnormally. Does he brush his teeth by moving his head up and down, and back and forth? Does he have to sit down to tie his shoes so he doesn't fall down? Does he hang his shoes up in his closet, and place his shirts and pants on the ground? Maybe Dominique isn't only changing the fundamentals of basketball, but also life? Somebody needs to follow his everyday activities and report back, because his unorthodox style is definitely efficient on the court, maybe he is on to something in everyday situations as well.
- So Mike Davis not only has Tonsillitis, but he also has Bell's Palsy which is a paralysis of the face. I can't believe how well he is playing with both of the afflictions. He was an absolute monster on the boards, and made great jump shot after great jump shot! Also I am loving the Tisdale to Davis alley-oops that we have been seeing in the last few games. I still don't know how Davis caught the lob in this game and threw it down. On the flip side though, I don't know how he rim checked himself on a wide open dunk under the hoop.
- You have to love the way Demitri is penetrating to the hole a lot more than he has been in the past. If anything, he gets to the foul line where he has been shooting very well this season. He also opens up our post players for jump shots, which at this point in their careers is much better than their post up skills. The real reason I brought this up is because CBS had a graphic that said McCamey is a "Very Good Penetrator" and after 3 beers, Yoder, Tom and I made various penetration jokes for the next 5 minutes while Yoder's fiancee looked at us like we were one of her high school students. My 2 favorite jokes based on this are "At least we have that in common" and "I hear he doesn't finish very well" So to recap: 3 frat boys + 3 Coors lights + unintentional innuendo = Inappropriate High School Humor.
- Thank God Trent Meacham shot well in this game, because I'm pretty sure that nobody would have been able to take another Meacham-Legion shooting debacle. He is still not off of my shit-list though, because he has played terrible in 9 of our 11 Big Ten games. I want 2 big games out of him this week at Northwestern and Indiana.
- You know why Chris Kramer is such a good defender? Because he hacks on every play. He reaches on every drive, swats at the ball when you go up for a shot, runs through screens instead of around them. That being said, he doesn't get called for it, and most times gets alot of ball, so he is effective. After this game though, I think that Chester Frazier will be the Defensive MVP of the Big Ten. He has now shut down Robbie Hummel, E'Twan Moore, Travon Hughes twice, Evan Turner and Kalin Lucas. This guy is gonna be sorely missed next year. Did you ever think that in 2009-10 you would say outloud "Man I wish we had Chester Frazier out there right now"? Probably not, but mark my words, you will.
- The most alarming thing with this team right now aside from the fact that we can't win on the road is Mike Tisdale's rebounding. Mike had only 1 rebound against Purdue. That was his second straight game with only 1 rebound. The most rebounds that he has gotten in the Big Ten so far? 6 against Purdue on the road. On the road especially he needs to step it up. We play Penn State twice, and if you haven't seen them yet, trust me, they crash the hell out of the offensive boards! Tisdale needs to focus on this coming down the stretch, because obviously this is a weakness that opposing teams are going to look to exploit. Tisdale has one more rebound (28) in Big Ten play than Mike Davis (27) has had in his last 2 games!
Overall this was a really good game by Illinois. They did have their typical strecthes of not hitting any shots, but the difference in this game was the fact that they only had 2 turnovers in the second half. To add to that, they screened much better in this game which allowed for many open jump shots. The last thing that I want to add to this is how much I love watching Chester Frazier trying to dunk on people! The only thing that could happen this season that would be more memorable that Chester dunking on DeShawn Sims and trying to dunk on Keaton Moore-Grant would be a Final Four.
Durty
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