Illinois-UNLV

[TarkisGod]

I have developed a dumb habit, especially when we are about to play a P5 team, of perusing their message boards. It’s usually to measure the level of disrespect they feel for us. So, I looked at a few Illini boards just now.

I could find not one message that expressed anything other than fear. Most ran like this exchange:

“McCoy and Juiston are double double machines. And I don't mean 10 and 10. Really tough matchup for the Illini.”

That evoked this response:

“Yeah, they look a little scary. Maybe we sucked them in with our game against Peay and we catch them by surprise!

The front-line situation looks grim, but the part that concerns me is that they have experienced and talented guards. We need our guards to win this game for us, so that is not good news.

Our strategy: Foul Juiston on every play. He is shooting 39.1% from the free throw line (9 of 23). Unfortunately, the big guy hits his free throws at 73.6%

This could be a tough one. They have two overtime losses to two pretty good teams. This could be a gut check.”

Their fans don’t believe they can beat us. I agree

Go Rebels!

 

[cmarshel]

I'm originally from Illinois and have an ongoing bet, whenever our teams play, with a cousin that is a strong Illini supporter. I'm looking for payback from last time.

 

[j. spilotro]

I have developed a dumb habit, especially when we are about to play a P5 team, of perusing their message boards. It’s usually to measure the level of disrespect they feel for us. So, I looked at a few Illini boards just now.

I could find not one message that expressed anything other than fear. Most ran like this exchange:

“McCoy and Juiston are double double machines. And I don't mean 10 and 10. Really tough matchup for the Illini.”

That evoked this response:

“Yeah, they look a little scary. Maybe we sucked them in with our game against Peay and we catch them by surprise!

The front-line situation looks grim, but the part that concerns me is that they have experienced and talented guards. We need our guards to win this game for us, so that is not good news.

Our strategy: Foul Juiston on every play. He is shooting 39.1% from the free throw line (9 of 23). Unfortunately, the big guy hits his free throws at 73.6%

This could be a tough one. They have two overtime losses to two pretty good teams. This could be a gut check.”

Their fans don’t believe they can beat us. I agree

Go Rebels!

Their fans sound in tune. Slaughter.

 

[MonsterJam]

It'll be a slaughter!

 

[UMLV]

Nobody has beaten us in 40 min yet...

 

[TarkisGod]

Nobody has beaten us in 40 min yet...

Excellent point!

Go Rebels!

 

[Jaycg15]

Hey, guys. I'm an Illinois fan. I've been looking for information about your style of play, and haven't found much online. If anyone would like to tell me about your team, I'd be grateful!

Thanks.

 

[khokhol8]

Hey, guys. I'm an Illinois fan. I've been looking for information about your style of play, and haven't found much online. If anyone would like to tell me about your team, I'd be grateful!

Thanks.

I'm going to be careful not to give too much away just incase this is the Illinois head coach, Brad Underwood, trying to get some extra "inside" scouting...LOL

Our guys like to get up and down. They are averaging 91.8 points per game (6th in the country). In the half court they like to get the ball inside to McCoy as the 1st option. The Rebels clean the glass well and average 46.4 rebounds per game (2nd in the country). They also share the ball really well and average 20.3 assists per game (3rd in the country) with our point guard, Johnson getting most of the assists.

Weak spots include free throw shooting from some of our players and inconsistency from 3. You all (Illinois) may have a shot to win if you can turn it into a slow, half court game where both teams are shooting a lot of threes. If it's up tempo and UNLV is getting the ball inside to McCoy for good looks consistently then I hope the fans that traveled for the game have fun in the Casinos because the game will be all Rebels!

 

[1Tripoda]

Hey, guys. I'm an Illinois fan. I've been looking for information about your style of play, and haven't found much online. If anyone would like to tell me about your team, I'd be grateful!

Thanks.

Seriously, you don't know? The UNLV RUNNIN' REBELS. We runs a lot. Slower teams tend to abandoned offensive rebounds efforts altogether just so they can get back on defense. We still faster than them.

 

[TarkisGod]

I forgot to mention, in my OP, that the number one complaint on the Illini boards is the 9pm (11pm CST) start. They’re afraid the game won’t end until 2am their time. Oh my goodness!

Is it unheard of for Illinois fans to stay up past midnight on a Saturday night?

Go Rebels!

 

[Vegas007]

Team has gotten sloppy with too many turnovers and bad possessions and poor guard play in the 2 close losses we had. We would be undefeated if we were 2-0 in overtime instead of 0-2, but the fact is we are 0-2 because we didn’t win those games when we had the chance.

I’m still not sure where this team is at right now, but that always seems to be true before conference play.

This has to be the highest scoring team we’ve had since the early 90’s though.

 

[Jaycg15]

Hey, guys. I'm an Illinois fan. I've been looking for information about your style of play, and haven't found much online. If anyone would like to tell me about your team, I'd be grateful!

Thanks.

I'm going to be careful not to give too much away just incase this is the Illinois head coach, Brad Underwood, trying to get some extra "inside" scouting...LOL

Our guys like to get up and down. They are averaging 91.8 points per game (6th in the country). In the half court they like to get the ball inside to McCoy as the 1st option. The Rebels clean the glass well and average 46.4 rebounds per game (2nd in the country). They also share the ball really well and average 20.3 assists per game (3rd in the country) with our point guard, Johnson getting most of the assists.

Weak spots include free throw shooting from some of our players and inconsistency from 3. You all (Illinois) may have a shot to win if you can turn it into a slow, half court game where both teams are shooting a lot of threes. If it's up tempo and UNLV is getting the ball inside to McCoy for good looks consistently then I hope the fans that traveled for the game have fun in the Casinos because the game will be all Rebels!

Underwood's strategy is to score in 7 seconds or less. We have been very successful in transition, so most teams go to 1-2-2 3/4 court to slow us down. I think we're going to see a lot of shots tonight. We also crash the offensive boards hard. I think we average just shy of what you do, but our post players aren't nearly as good as yours on the boards.

You'll see more ball pressure than you've seen all year from us to prevent post entries, but it leaves us susceptible at times to backdoors and lobs.

I think we're going to see a fun ballgame.

 

[Jaycg15]

Team has gotten sloppy with too many turnovers and bad possessions and poor guard play in the 2 close losses we had. We would be undefeated if we were 2-0 in overtime instead of 0-2, but the fact is we are 0-2 because we didn’t win those games when we had the chance.

I’m still not sure where this team is at right now, but that always seems to be true before conference play.

This has to be the highest scoring team we’ve had since the early 90’s though.

That's the same thing that happened to us. Sounds like a similar team, but we're more like your team last year, possibly.

 

[Jaycg15]

I've heard plenty about your offense, but I couldn't find anything about how you play defense.

 

[j. spilotro]

Underwood's strategy is to score in 7 seconds or less. We have been very successful in transition, so most teams go to 1-2-2 3/4 court to slow us down. I think we're going to see a lot of shots tonight. We also crash the offensive boards hard. I think we average just shy of what you do, but our post players aren't nearly as good as yours on the boards.

You'll see more ball pressure than you've seen all year from us to prevent post entries, but it leaves us susceptible at times to backdoors and lobs.

I think we're going to see a fun ballgame.

If you try to score in less than 7 seconds, I think UNLV will run away with it. A fast game will benefit the Rebels more. They’re unselfish, space the floor pretty well, have a nifty PG that makes plays for other and every position on the floor is at least a threat to go for 20.

Slow down games, games vs decent zones, grinders, tough/physical defensive teams, and teams that have multiple long distance marksmen are what sorry me most. “Pedestrian” teams don’t worry me much.

 

[TarkisGod]

That's the same thing that happened to us. Sounds like a similar team, but we're more like your team last year, possibly.

I'd like to believe that you guys are as bad as we were last season. That would make tonight’s game a laugher. We are worlds away from where we were then. But I’m not falling for that trap.

I expect a tough, physical game. The Illini played poorly this week, but still managed to scratch out a win vs Austin Peay. Underwood is too good of a coach to allow his team to arrive in Vegas unprepared. I believe we will win, but not easily. UNLV 93- Illinois 85.

Let's play ball!

Go Rebels! .

 

[TarkisGod]

Here’s a "somewhat intelligent" assessment from the Illini board. Although, his thinking that we are likely to throw a zone at them, seems like he’s really ill-informed about us. And his grammar and train of thought goes awry in spots.

“It's hard to predict what team we will see, our inconsistent play, not having same players give a offense to rely on. We do have 4 guys avg in dbl figures, which is why we can hope anyone could have a break out game. They will zone us, and we do need to have a perimeter game with good shooting. We can't let the big guy dominte(sic) middle so making him come after us outside, and draw fouls would be a good idea


Hope we continue good defense, AJ to come out shooting, force them into turnovers galore. Game time will be a asset for them, but not that much we could hope.

Think we should win with a solid effort. Anything less, letting McCoy have his way, we lose..”

As the game looms closer (An hour-and-a-half), I’m starting to get nervous about the outcome. I still believe the Rebels will prevail, but it may be a nail-biter, which is rough on the pit of my gut.

Go Rebels!

 

[Jaycg15]

Underwood's strategy is to score in 7 seconds or less. We have been very successful in transition, so most teams go to 1-2-2 3/4 court to slow us down. I think we're going to see a lot of shots tonight. We also crash the offensive boards hard. I think we average just shy of what you do, but our post players aren't nearly as good as yours on the boards.

You'll see more ball pressure than you've seen all year from us to prevent post entries, but it leaves us susceptible at times to backdoors and lobs.

I think we're going to see a fun ballgame.

If you try to score in less than 7 seconds, I think UNLV will run away with it. A fast game will benefit the Rebels more. They’re unselfish, space the floor pretty well, have a nifty PG that makes plays for other and every position on the floor is at least a threat to go for 20.

Slow down games, games vs decent zones, grinders, tough/physical defensive teams, and teams that have multiple long distance marksmen are what sorry me most. “Pedestrian” teams don’t worry me much.

We have the 16th highest paced offense. We're much more efficient at a high pace.
We will see soon enough.

Good luck!

 

[RebelSoldat]

So far so good

 

[ImmaRebel]

These refs are really making their presence known.

 

[Vegas007]

That's the same thing that happened to us. Sounds like a similar team, but we're more like your team last year, possibly.

I’m sure your team is much better than ours was last year. We only won 11 games. Both teams are at 7 wins now and should easily win more than 11.

 

[TarkisGod]

Rebels trailing 49-50 14:28 left in regulation. A bad call on Shakur, but that's why you don't pick up the dumb fouls earlier.

 

[TarkisGod]

Tied at 54. C'mon Rebels!

 

[Vegas007]

Lets actually win one of these close games.

 

[TarkisGod]

Rebels trail 60-61 with 7:56 left. This game is trouble. Refs suck...

 

[UNLVfan81]

Refs are horrible ... Mc Coy cant hit free throws tonight

 

[TarkisGod]

JoJo just made two, but the Rebs are killing themselves at the line.

 

[TarkisGod]

UNLV 71-68 w/ 3:42 in reg. Let's close this out!

 

[TarkisGod]

80-71 Rebels with just over 2 min. left. Hardy getting good time down the stretch.

 

[TarkisGod]

We're going to have to make FT's to win this game

 

[TarkisGod]

87-79 with 21 seconds. Should be safe...right?

 

[TarkisGod]

Yes!!! Rebels...Rebels...

 

[Jaycg15]

I'd say good game, but that was ugly. Congratulations