Illinois Basketball: 5 NBA Draft 1st round picks the Illini faced last season

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Jun 22, 2017; Brooklyn, NY, USA; A general view of a video board displaying all thirty first round selections in the 2017 NBA Draft at Barclays Center. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports /

The Illinois basketball team struggled last season against some great talent.

Illinois played a lot of games against some of the best talent in the country. While they did only finish the regular season 18-13 overall and fell in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament, that doesn’t stray away from the fact they played against some top players.

The NBA Draft was held last night and the best college basketball players were selected by NBA teams to hopefully, build into a championship-contending organization. That is the hope of all NBA franchises but some players pan out and others don’t. It is still too early to tell who will be successful in the NBA at this point but all of the players selected are supposed to be good.

Illinois went up against some of the players selected in the first round of the NBA Draft. The team we saw last season struggled with some of the players but did well against others. But, knowing that these players went in the first round gives me a sense of relief to why we struggled so much.

Here is how the Illinois basketball team fared against the NBA Draft first round players last season.

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