As an Illinois basketball fan, feeding the positive dog is becoming harder and harder with each news cycle.
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When FanSided hired me to write a few posts on a monthly basis for Writing Illini I was ecstatic. I was looking for a way to share my thoughts and analysis, as amateurish as it may be, with like-minded fans of Illini basketball.
I was under no illusion that I would always be writing about wins, recruiting successes, and buzzer beating shots on the road in the B1G.
In fact, I knew Illinois was in a very dangerous place rivaling some of the worst periods in its history.
But as my earliest posts reflected, the Illini appeared to be turning the corner. There was real potential for success this year before the injuries started piling up.
Throughout the year I was planning to write about why we won or lost, trying to glean some insight from the stat sheets, and scouring kenpom to analyze the competition on occasion and track Illinois’ development over the season.
I thought I’d be writing about success, or lack thereof, in the B1G and NCAA Tournaments and what that meant to the program going forward. Finally, I was looking forward to writing about recruiting hits and misses.
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For the most part, I have been able to write about much of that and it has been a wonderful experience and one I look forward to continuing.
Unfortunately, it was one of those years, wherein I was writing about injuries, mostly analyzing losses, discussing John Groce, and imagining what could have been with an even moderately healthy team.
There were some “ups” and many “downs” this year, as everyone knows who cares about Illinois basketball.
There were some positive things to take away from this season that will be fertile ground for future posts, including the outstanding development of Jalen Coleman Lands, the huge step forward that Maverick Morgan made at the end of the season, Malcolm Hill’s amazing season and impending senior year, the return of Tracy Abrams, and a good start to the 2017 recruiting class.
But there was one thing that I never thought I’d need to write about.
It is incredibly painful and disturbing to have to write about domestic violence in the pages of the Writing Illini.
But with recent charges of domestic battery against junior point guard Jaylon Tate and shooting guard Kendrick Nunn, this issue shines a bright light on the Illini basketball program, Coach Groce, the culture Illinois is trying to recapture, and what it means to be an “Illini guy.”
Illinois Fighting Illini
There has been an increase in the number of people calling for new Athletic Director Josh Whitman to fire Groce, despite Whitman’s statement on his first day at work that he was keeping the embattled coach.
The issue for me is not whether Groce is a good coach – the development of Nunn, Hill, JCL, and Morgan indicates to me that he and his staff or capable of taking players to the next level. What bothers me is whether he is really recruiting “Illini Guys.”
The charges against Nunn and Tate are just that – charges. But if they are sustained in either or both cases, it raises real questions about whether some of the players understand the opportunity they’ve been given.
The opportunity to play basketball for the Illini, to wear the orange and blue, and to get an education at one of the best public universities in the country is something incredibly rare. It is a lucky young man that gets this opportunity.
Darius Paul didn’t understand that, even after a second chance. Leron Black lost sight of it recently when he was arrested on charges of aggravated assault. And Nunn and Tate might have forgotten this too.
Black’s aggravated assault charge is disturbing enough, but domestic violence is one of the most horrible crimes one can commit, and it occurs all too frequently in the United States.
There is no second chance for an Illini player who is guilty of domestic violence. I am all for letting the legal process play out and its important to note that all three have pleaded not guilty. But these arrests betray a disturbing trend.
Let’s assume for a second that some or all of the allegations are true. Why is this happening?
I attribute it to a lack of respect for the University of Illinois, and perhaps just as importantly, a lack of respect for Coach Groce and the Illini basketball program.
We need players who understand the responsibility of representing the University. We need players whose off-court actions make people proud instead of embarrassed. We need players who think about what impact their off court actions will have on their teammates.
We need guys who are “Illini guys” all the time, not just some of the time.
To be clear, I think most of the guys on the team are Illini guys. The only outstanding question is who isn’t?
These problems surface many questions. Once all of this plays out, it’ll be incumbent upon Whitman and Groce to address those questions and to convince Illini Nation that better times are ahead.
They need to convince us that the positive dog we’ve been encouraged to feed isn’t going to turn around and bite our hands…again.