That is it that is the headline. Ayo Dosunmu is THE BEST CLOSER in college basketball. He has done it since his freshman year, and it will never get old seeing him save our ass from bad loss. He had eight big points with about three minutes left in the game. You know you are the real deal when the announcers call it Ayo time.
Yes, Illinois should have blown out Northwestern but, we got the win and that is the only thing that matters. To quote Al Davis “Just win baby.” Illinois won and we move on to the next game against Minnesota on the 20th.
Some positives to take away from the win, other players showed up. Ayo came up big with those shots but before then he was not putting up the numbers that we are used to. It was nice to see Giorgi B have 10 points and dominate the post. Trent Frazier had nine-points and then Adam Miller had 10 points, but he missed a lot of open threes in the second half.
King Kofi dominated this game. He now has his 15th double double which is second in all of college basketball. He had 17 points and 10 rebounds. He was an absolute problem on the offense glass for the Wildcats. He had six offensive rebounds. Also 13 of his 17 points came in the second half after only playing five minutes in the first.
Of course, like every game there are negatives. The first negative is the turnovers. Illinois had 15 total turnovers in the game. Those turnovers lead to Northwestern getting back into the game.
The next issue is having periods where we do not score, or we can’t get a stop. To end the first half, we went on a drought. We ended the first half up by 12 when it should have been more like 20. Then quickly into the second half that 12-point lead went into a five-point lead. To go deep in March Illinois is going to have to play a full game. Good teams will beat us in the tournament if we keep that up.
The last thing that was an issue was free throws. This is a reoccurring issue for Illinois as they went 11 for 22 from the line. It was not just Kofi missing them either everyone was missing free throws. That is something Illinois will have to work on also if they want to make a run in March.
Overall though a win is a win and if Illinois can clean these mental issues they will be a hard team to stop in March.
I also wore my Deron Williams jersey which has been my lucky jersey all season only having one lost when they loss to Maryland.
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