Illinois basketball had a bit of a scare on Friday night, as the Oakland Golden Grizzles brought their A-game.
The Illini, once again, came out of the gates and were punched in the face. Oakland jumped out to a 10-2 lead before the 17-minute mark in the first half. Illinois quickly responded with some tenacious defense, though.
Oakland didn’t fold to Illinois’ pressure. While the Golden Grizzlies struggled to score, they still hung around for the entire game. It wasn’t until the final 10 minutes that Illinois finally took control of this game. The Illini would eventually wake up and take down Oakland, 64-53.
Here are five observations from the Illinois basketball win over Oakland
1. The Illinois defense was stout
I don’t know what it is, but during the Brad Underwood era of Illinois basketball, the team starts extremely slow. We come out of the gates sluggish, and the opposing team leads five minutes into the game.
Friday night was no different. Oakland started the game hot, taking a 10-2 lead that turned into a 12-6 deficit for the Illini less than six minutes into the game. The crazy part about the Golden Grizzlies scoring 12 points before the 14-minute mark of the first half is that ended up being 22.6% of their points for the entire game.
After giving up 12 points to start the game, Illinois’ defense flipped a switch. We weren’t scoring a ton, and we knew we needed stout defense to turn the tides of this game.
Over the next roughly six and a half minutes, Oakland would score a whopping three points. Illinois managed to regain the lead during that time too.
I attribute the slow defensive starts to a lack of effort with perimeter defense. The Illini weren’t closing out strong, and this enabled the Golden Grizzlies to have low-contested three-point attempts. The overall effort on defense wasn’t there for Illinois either. That all changes when a team like Oakland comes out and punches you in the mouth, though.
By the game’s end, Illinois’ defense proved stout. We only gave up 27 points in that first half, meaning we gave up 15 points in the final 15 minutes, which is insanely good. For the game, Illinois only allowed 53 points on 37.5% shooting from the field and 25% from three-point range. That is a great night for the Illini on that side of the court.