Illinois Basketball: 4 keys for the Illini to take down Ohio State

The Illinois basketball team has advanced to the Big Ten Tournament title game to take on the Ohio State Buckeyes.

These two teams met twice in the regular season, and the Illini split the series with the Buckeyes. Now the rubber match will be held as one of the biggest games of the year. The winner will be crowned the Big Ten Tournament champion.

Here are four keys for the Illini to take down Ohio State.

1. Win the turnover battle

This is an obvious one, but it is a lot easier said than done. Illinois hasn’t been great in the turnover department this season, as they enter the Ohio State game averaging 13.3 turnovers per game. This also ranks No. 184 in the nation.

Lately, though, the Illini seem to be more disciplined with the basketball. They haven’t been coughing it up as much, and it helped greatly in the last game against the Buckeyes.

In the final game of the regular season, Illinois took down Ohio State by a score of 73-68. A big reason we were able to come away with the win was due to the fact we didn’t turn the ball over too many times. Illinois only lost the turnover battle 11-9, which is impressive.

The biggest culprit for turnovers in that previous game was actually Kofi Cockburn who had three turnovers on the night. Usually, turnovers are coming from either Ayo Dosunmu or Andre Curbelo, but both of these talented guards have really started to take care of the ball recently.

As long as Illinois keeps the turnovers down, or at least the turnover margin relatively small, then we should be able to come away with a Big Ten Tournament crown.