Purdue 64, Illinois 47

The Illini road woes continued today in losing to Purdue, 64-47. Box Score
Purdue has two really good players, Teague and Landry, and they were so much better than Illinois today it was never close. The Illini were embarrassing in the first half, stuck for the longest time at 4 points, and allowing a huge run by Purdue before recovering late in the half to keep it within 14 points. The Illini never could catch up, and for Illinois fans, it must have been tough to watch--it was for me.

I will try to summarize the problems (and potential solutions) for this Illini team.

1. We are the worst free throw shooting team in the Big 10. My recommendation for Coach Weber is to require every player to shoot 100 foul shots daily until they improve. Maybe they already do this, but the results don't show.

2. Our players are not that talented. Given this problem, I encourage Weber to use every scholarship available, rather than saving scholarhips. I would also consider holding try-outs on campus for players who can shoot (ours can't), and try recruiting some Junior College players, since freshman aren't allowed to play in Weber's system. (We might be worse next year, before we improve.)

3. In the injuries area, there are too many injury problems this year to be explained merely by coincidence or bad luck. Our coaching staff should re-examine its practice routines, since many of the injuries have occurred in practice. The off-season program for the fitness of players needs to be looked at, as well as solutions provided by the trainer and physicians for the numerous foot and ankle problems.

4. We are playing a three guard offense with guards that can't shoot. Frazier and Smith are not shooting, so why play them with McBride? If you don't have guards who can shoot, you need to play big, and get the ball inside for dunks, period.

5. Defensive rebounding is poor in many games. If the players on the court cannot block out and rebound, they need to be benched in favor of players who can.

The worst insult in watching this game was the halftime highlights of a big win by Arkansas, with several great plays made by Patrick Beverley. This is the guy that wanted to play at Illinois, and we still don't know why he was not offered a scholarship by Weber.

Now back home for some games, as we continue to follow this offensively-challenged team.