Illinois Basketball: 5 observations from the Illini win over Oakland

5. Illinois needs to live inside the three-point arc

I would love it if Illinois was a three-point shooting team that could just knock down shots from deep at any given second. It is nice to have the luxury of jacking up a deep shot and seeing it going in.

That isn’t this team, though. While Illinois has a bunch of players who like to take three-point shots and would love to be good at this skill, we just aren’t good at perimeter shooting.

In the game against Eastern Illinois, the Illini shot 31.3% from three-point range, and this includes the first half where we were just 4-of-17 from deep. Illinois got even worse against Oakland. On Friday night, the Illini shot 4-of-16 from downtown, which is 25%.

Illinois failed to convert on a single three-pointer in the first half, going 0-of-6. We would get to seven straight misses from three-point range before the first one dropped at the 17:54 mark in the second half.

Offensively, Illinois is not good a three-point shooting, and we haven’t been for a couple of years. Last season, we shot 29.2%, which ranked No. 213 in the nation. But one thing we are good at is paint production.

Illinois shot 47.3% from the field against Oakland, but if you strip away the rough three-point shooting night, the Illini converted 56.4% of field goals inside the three-point arc.

Ty Rodgers was a big-time contributor in the paint. He scoops up rebounds and can finish at the hoop. Coleman Hawkins does his best work inside the three-point arc. When he gets dribbling and does the sky hook, it is something to marvel at.

And then you have Terrence Shannon Jr. When he has his bulldog mentality, he is unstoppable. He can get to the rim whenever he wants. While he gets fouled most times, it benefits Illinois by getting the opposing team in foul trouble and gets Shannon to the free throw line for, hopefully, easy points.

Illinois has tried and will continue to try to be a three-point shooting team. That is not what they are, though. This team could thrive if we just lived inside the three-point arc.