Illinois coach Brad Underwood is hoping his 8th-ranked team learned a lesson from a 90-86 defeat against No. 11 Alabama on Wednesday in Chicago.
“We need to learn how not to lose,” Underwood said.
Underwood and the Fighting Illini (4-1) will attempt not to lose Saturday when they welcome Long Island to Champaign for another nonconference contest.
Illinois probably beats the Crimson Tide if it makes free throws. It got into the bonus fairly early in the second half but simply wasn’t able to convert foul shots, going a brutal 9-of-17 at the line in the half and 13-of-22 for the game.
That included guys like Andrej Stojakovic, who scored 26 points, going 2-for-5. It also included Keaton Wagler, an 85.3% foul shooter entering the game, missing 2 of 5, and David Mirkovic, 18 of 20 from the line entering Wednesday, clanking his only attempt.
In a fitting four-point contrast given the final margin, Alabama made 17 of 23 free throws.
“When you play a top-10 team, you sure as hell can’t go 9-for-17 from the free throw line,” said Underwood of the second half issues at the stripe. “They played better than what we did. A lot to learn for us in that moment.
“Every possession is important. We’re going to be in 25 more of these close games. I expect perfection. I demand perfection. I know it’s not going to happen but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to expect those type of things from those guys.”
Kylan Boswell is the team’s leading scorer at 19.2 points per game and is coming off a 22-point, seven-assist performance against Alabama. Mirkovic is adding 16.8 points and 12 rebounds per game as a freshman, while Stojakovic is also scoring 16.8 ppg and sinking 54.7% of his field goal attempts.
As a team, Illinois is averaging 95.4 ppg and connecting on 47.8% of its field goals. Its 47.0 rebounds per game rank ninth in Division I.
Meanwhile, Long Island (3-2) is coming off a 69-53 loss on Thursday night at Fordham. The Sharks simply couldn’t find the range from the field, hitting only 17 of 52 shots and going a miserable 1-of-15 from the 3-point line.
Jamal Fuller scored 19 points for Long Island and Malachi Davis added 11 but they didn’t get enough help. The result snapped a three-game winning streak for the Sharks.
Despite that result, LIU has been picked to win the Northeast Conference after reaching the conference tourney semifinals last season. It has scheduled like a program looking for big things as it opened with Notre Dame and later goes to Mississippi State and Georgia.
The Sharks’ coach might be the best player on the floor if he were still playing. Rod Strickland is in his fourth year running the program after scoring more than 14,000 points and dishing out nearly 8,000 assists in a 17-year NBA career. His best season came in 1997-98, when he led the league in assists and was an All-NBA Second Team choice.
This will be the first regular-season matchup between LIU and Illinois.
