Illinois Basketball: Breakdown of Illini shooting guard changes
Last season wasn’t great for the Illinois basketball team for many reasons.
2017-2018 Starters
The team didn’t perform well as a group and one area that really didn’t perform the way I had hoped was at the No. 2 spot or what some people call the shooting guard role.
For much of the season, this position was held by true freshman and 2017 Illinois Mr. Basketball, Mark Smith. He came into the program with high expectations of being a superstar after a tremendous senior campaign in high school. He went from a relatively unknown player who had committed to play baseball for Missouri, to one of the top 100 basketball players in the nation.
Smith didn’t catch on to the speed of the game very well, though. You could always see glimpses of how talented this could be, but nothing ever developed on a consistent basis. The transition from Smith to another player started happening in the Indiana victory. Smith only played four minutes in that game and didn’t start the rest of the season after that. He finished the year averaging 5.8 points, 1.4 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game and would transfer to Missouri.
A combination of Aaron Jordan and Mark Alstork filled the starting role in place of Smith. Alstork didn’t have the season many fans expected on the offensive end. He was tremendous on defense, but he couldn’t get the buckets to fall. He ended up averaging 5.8 points, 3.4 rebounds and 1.8 assists per game during his graduate transfer year.
The only player I was happy with out of this bunch was Jordan. He had his best year as a college basketball player and finished fifth on the team in scoring. While he did cool down toward the middle of the season, I was still happy with what I saw out of him. He ended up averaging 7.9 points and 3.1 rebounds per game.
2018-2019 Starters
Heading into this upcoming season, everything should be different with this position. Both the Marks are gone, and Jordan should be moving over to the No. 3 spot where he would fit better, in my opinion.
The starter I have for the No. 2 spot is incoming freshman Ayo Dosunmu. I have had him at the No. 1 at times, but I am going more conservative with this and putting him at the No. 2. This kid is the highlight of the class of 2018 and should be a true superstar from day one. He is the five-star, top 30, recruit the Illini snagged toward the end of 2017.
Dosunmu will provide more points at this position than we saw last season from any of the starters. He just has to eclipse the 7.9 points per game mark, and I think he has that in his sleep. He will be one of our leading scorers if not the leading scorer.
Behind Dosunmu, I am going with Da’Monte Williams. Williams didn’t get to play a lot last season for a few reasons. One was that he was less than a year removed from a torn ACL during his senior season in high school. I am sure the coaches wanted to ease him into playing time. He also had to play behind Smith who was given playing time over him, but I am not so sure he deserved it.
Williams ended up averaging 3.5 points, 2.9 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game in only 16.9 minutes of action. Those are solid stats, and I think they will increase as well.
I also have incoming freshman Alan Griffin at the third option at the No. 2 spot. Griffin could easily rise on this Illini roster and become a big-time contributor year one. He has that much talent, and I think he could be a great shooter. Griffin could become a very important piece to this team in the near future.
Next: Projected Illini starting lineup with Andres Feliz
Overall, I think the No. 2 guard spot improved greatly, and you can’t argue that. Dosunmu is a clear upgrade over Smith. The backup role got strong offensively with Williams and Griffin stepping in. And I think Williams and Dosunmu bring a great defensive presence as well. Illinois is going to be exponentially better at this position for the upcoming season.