Illinois Basketball: Top 5 non-conference games of all-time

The Illinois basketball non-conference schedule has been released for the upcoming season.

This schedule has been critiqued by some people and others think it could be a good thing that the lineup is weak. They don’t play much in the way of talented teams this upcoming campaign. There are only three teams on the schedule that made the NCAA tournament last year, and even those teams barely squeaked into the postseason.

In the history of the Illinois basketball team, there have been some monumental non-conference contests that have dictated how the team would do in the future. These games were important for one reason or another.

I even left some of the big-time games off this list as well. Illinois played Gonzaga a few years back and beat the No. 10 team in the nation in a year that they made the NCAA tournament. That was John Groce’s first season in Champaign. That was a great victory as well, but it didn’t make this list.

This list of the top five non-conference games of all-time consists of some amazing performances that boosted the program into another level. These games were necessary for the future of the program.

Here are the top five non-conference wins of all-time.