Illinois game

[SpartyNash]

Place is rocking, Izzone alumni showing out

 

[gotime909]

I might've been a little early with those MAC comments about Loyer. Hes definitely looking better.

 

[SpartyNash]

Henry has looked very confident tonight

 

[SpartyNash]

What an awful call, but additionally why are you even risking taking a charge?

 

[Spartanmack]

if henry and bingham could hit just 50% from the foul line we'd be up 10 at half. If they were good FT shooters and Ahrens didnt blow thos last 2 we be up 13 or better right now.

56% as a team and i believe that includes the front end of all 1-and-1s.

 

[SpartyNash]

This is easily the best tillman has played all year IMO

 

[Spartanmack]

This is easily the best tillman has played all year IMO

best ive seen this year for sure and nice to see him play that well inside against a big guy on both ends.

 

[MSUMatt28]

Agreed on Tillman. Good effort tonight. Illinois has some dudes, but boy they sure can't shoot.

I like that we're getting different guys now stepping up at different times. Henry had a good first half, then Brown got going in the second half. Other guys like Bingham, Loyer, and Watts gave them moments when needed, and Tillman and Cassius are finding consistency again.

Gotta win all these early ones before the schedule gets tougher later on.

 

[Spartanmack]

Agreed on Tillman. Good effort tonight. Illinois has some dudes, but boy they sure can't shoot.

I like that we're getting different guys now stepping up at different times. Henry had a good first half, then Brown got going in the second half. Other guys like Bingham, Loyer, and Watts gave them moments when needed, and Tillman and Cassius are finding consistency again.

Gotta win all these early ones before the schedule gets tougher later on.

the only thing that scares me about this game is the possibility that Illinois' horrible shooting masked one of our biggest weaknesses - perimeter defense. It's not like they weren't getting open shots, they just couldn't hit anything. Even if the defense wasn't great, it's nice for once to see a team not have their best 3 pt shooting night against us.

the schedule is definitely back end loaded and 5 of the last 8 games are on the road - that's not gonna be fun. But Sunday is gonna be tough even without Livers. Need to win at home.

Anybody else notice how fast that Dosunmu kid is? Seems like he just blew by everyone getting to the basket, made me wonder how good of a wide receiver he could be - 6'5" and lightning quick, seems to have good hands, would probably need to add 15 lbs.

 

[MSUMatt28]

the only thing that scares me about this game is the possibility that Illinois' horrible shooting masked one of our biggest weaknesses - perimeter defense. It's not like they weren't getting open shots, they just couldn't hit anything. Even if the defense wasn't great, it's nice for once to see a team not have their best 3 pt shooting night against us.

the schedule is definitely back end loaded and 5 of the last 8 games are on the road - that's not gonna be fun. But Sunday is gonna be tough even without Livers. Need to win at home.

Anybody else notice how fast that Dosunmu kid is? Seems like he just blew by everyone getting to the basket, made me wonder how good of a wide receiver he could be - 6'5" and lightning quick, seems to have good hands, would probably need to add 15 lbs.

There's been quite a few games this year where the opponent has shot the lights out from outside, and in some of them I didn't necessarily think the defense was bad. The past few games that hasn't happened, though against weaker competition. Not sure if suddenly the defense has gotten better or maybe the percentages are started to even out.

I think pretty much Illinois is full of bad shooters. A bunch of the shots they were taking from outside were nowhere near going in.

 

[johnny2x2x]

That was a really fun game to watch and was very intense for an early conference game. Illinois shot poorly, but they’re a bad shooting team. They shot 1-11 from 3 and still beat Michigan handily.

We played hard and limited our turnovers. The post defense was great and we ran our offense really well. Look for this type of effort to carry over to Sunday.

 

[Spartanmack]

There's been quite a few games this year where the opponent has shot the lights out from outside, and in some of them I didn't necessarily think the defense was bad. The past few games that hasn't happened, though against weaker competition. Not sure if suddenly the defense has gotten better or maybe the percentages are started to even out.

I think pretty much Illinois is full of bad shooters. A bunch of the shots they were taking from outside were nowhere near going in.

yeah, they were definitely chucking up a lot of bricks which helped our transition game with all the long rebounds but to me it looked they were getting good looks. They took 28 threes, they definitely weren't all or even mostly bad looks.

I was actually nervous after the first five minutes of the 2nd half and almost posted about it - felt like we weren't taking advantage and pulling away when the defense was playing well then they got hot and almost tripled the lead in the next minute and from then on they had absolute control of the game.

 

[johnny2x2x]

This Illinois game might be the start of something, it obviously carried over to Sunday. The intensity and effort we are bringing means we don't have to be flawless to still win big.

Up to #8 in the AP Poll.

 

[Spartanmack]

This Illinois game might be the start of something, it obviously carried over to Sunday. The intensity and effort we are bringing means we don't have to be flawless to still win big.

Up to #8 in the AP Poll.

could have something to do with the competition. I expect the team to get better over the season, but I don't think rolling Illinois and uofm without Livers is an indication that we're suddenly ready to go toe-to-toe with the teams that beat us by double digits. Those teams are going to get better too.

Thankfully the schedule works in our favor for a while - we have 8 mostly very winnable games (PSU and at Wisco look like the toughest) before the tough home stretch starting with @ uofm, from there we get MD 2x, PSU and OSU and 5 of those last 8 are on the road.

 

[MSUMatt28]

Not a dominating win vs Minnesota but good to keep winning the home games. Purdue at Mackey will be tough. They like seemingly most Big Ten teams have some strength in the post (look at the numbers Williams put up vs UM) and that environment is going to be nasty.

 

[Spartanmack]

Not a dominating win vs Minnesota but good to keep winning the home games. Purdue at Mackey will be tough. They like seemingly most Big Ten teams have some strength in the post (look at the numbers Williams put up vs UM) and that environment is going to be nasty.

The thing that makes me most nervous about this team, and it showed last night is the inconsistency of everyone who isn't Winston or Tillman. I love when Henry is playing in control and seems to know where to be in the offense but I think that consistency is more likely to come from either Brown or Watts. Whoever it is, I hope it happens soon.

I've been to 2 MSU games at Mackey - way back in the mid 90s when Gene Keady was still there. I used to have an audit client in Lafayette, IN and 2 of the 3 years on was on the job, MSU happened to be in town. It is a tough environment and as much as people hate Painter, he's the kind of coach that gets the most out of his players, esp when they are playing up. I hate playing at Illinois more - seems to be the one place where we always play as poorly as we can but other than possibly PSU or Wisco, that could be the toughest of our next 7 games.

 

[johnny2x2x]

I fully expect Purdue to hit like 60% from 3 Sunday, but they will be tired and Haarms might not even play. If we speed them up we should still win, but road games are murder and Purdue can be tough at home.

 

[MSUMatt28]

Well this Purdue game is a carbon copy of last year's. They seem to have the blueprint on this team. Either that or they catch us at just the right time.

Last year we were able to come back and make it a game in the second half. I'm less optimistic about these guys being able to do the same. People need to step up and start hitting some shots.