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Illinois Basketball: 5 burning questions for the Illini against Kansas

By Rees Woodcock

Feb 14, 2023; University Park, Pennsylvania, USA; Illinois Fighting Illini head coach Brad Underwood looks on from the bench during the first half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Bryce Jordan Center. Penn State defeated Illinois 93-81. Mandatory Credit: Matthew OHaren-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 14, 2023; University Park, Pennsylvania, USA; Illinois Fighting Illini head coach Brad Underwood looks on from the bench during the first half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Bryce Jordan Center. Penn State defeated Illinois 93-81. Mandatory Credit: Matthew OHaren-USA TODAY Sports /
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EUGENE, OREGON – FEBRUARY 11: Quincy Guerrier #13 of the Oregon Ducks looks on during the first half against the UCLA Bruins at Matthew Knight Arena on February 11, 2023 in Eugene, Oregon. (Photo by Soobum Im/Getty Images) /

2. Will the minutes start looking like a regular game?

Kind of piggybacking off the first slide, I am wondering if Brad Underwood is going to treat the Kansas exhibition like a dress rehearsal. Is this going to be played as if it were a regular season game?

A part of treating it like a regular season game is where the minutes will go. I am going to be watching to see if Underwood starts distributing minutes as if it were a regular season contest.

In the first exhibition against Ottawa, 12 different Illinois players received at least 10 minutes in the game. Even if this was a regular season game, up 29 at halftime and winning by 51, there are going to be deep bench players seeing time.

But I feel like Underwood was going to get his bench players a lot of minutes against Ottawa regardless. It was an exhibition game, and Illinois needed to see what we had on the bench.

I could see Underwood tightening the minutes up against Kansas, though. The starters will each likely have around 20 minutes. The bench will probably be much shorter too.

Justin Harmon, Quincy Guerrier, Dain Dainja, Sencire Harris, and Niccolo Moretti will probably get the bulk of the bench minutes. I don’t expect to see Dra Gibbs-Lawhorn get nearly 17 minutes, as he did against Ottawa. I have him around 3-5 minutes in each game. I also believe AJ Redd, Keaton Kutcher, and Max Williams, all non-scholarship guys, will rarely see minutes in a game.

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