Illinois slugs out win over Hoosiers

By Greg Taylor         

[FEB. 7, 2005]  CHAMPAIGN -- Super Bowl Sunday brought a super defensive effort from the No. 1 team in the land, as the Illini beat their rivals to the east, the Indiana Hoosiers, 60-47. Illinois held Indiana to 37 percent shooting from the field and appeared to keep Indiana from running any kind of offense for significant stretches of the game.

Illinois was led in scoring by junior James Augustine with 16 points, but it was Deron Williams, who scored just one point but dished out 11 assists, who was the story of the game in game in many ways. First, Williams seemed to be locked in defensively from the beginning. Also, he was poised enough to understand his shot was not falling and decided to set up his teammates for great looks most of the night. And finally, he was in rare form at the press conference after the game, having fun with "interesting" questions from reporters not typically seen at the Assembly Hall.

The win moves Illinois to 23-0 on the year, 9-0 in the conference, and leaves the Orange Invasion just seven regular-season games from perfection.

Illinois will return to action on Tuesday night on the road in Ann Arbor, where a struggling Michigan team has lost six straight games and should play once again without its best player, junior shooting guard Daniel Horton. Illinois seems to be a team of destiny in many ways, as witnessed by the players the Illini will not have faced yesterday and tomorrow (Indiana was without star guard Bracey Wright, out with an ankle injury).

Illinois looked poised to win by 40 points after running out to a 20-3 lead 11 minutes into the game. Augustine and seniors Roger Powell and Nick Smith seemed to establish Illinois down in the paint during the run. Many on media row were wondering if this game might set an Indiana record for first-half futility, but the Hoosiers responded by ending the half on a 17-6 run over the final nine minutes to pull within 26-20 at the halftime break.

The second half was in many ways the same story as the first. Illinois several times extended the lead to 17 or 18, but each time Indiana rallied to cut the lead. Overall, Illinois was not the offensive juggernaut seen at Wisconsin or at Michigan State. But, bottom line, Illinois wins again and continues its storybook season. Four Illini scored in double figures, and the outcome of the game was never really in question.

Quick hitters:

• Illinois excelled again from the free-throw line, making 18 of 20 (90 percent).

• Illinois struggled from the 3-point line, making just four of 16, the team’s low number on the season for made 3-point baskets.

• Indiana started four freshmen, yet committed just 15 turnovers on the day.

• Wright and Williams were high school teammates at The Colony, a suburb of Dallas, Texas.

• Illinois will not play Indiana again this season. Each Big Ten team faces four conference foes just once each year, due to expansion and the advent of the conference tourney. This season, Illinois will not host Michigan or Michigan State and will not travel to Indiana or Minnesota.

• Game date and time for the final home game of 2005 is set, as Illinois will host Purdue on March 3 at 8 p.m. The game will be televised by ESPN2.

• The Big Ten tourney is just around the corner, and Illinois seems to be near a lock for the No. 1 seed, meaning the Illini would open on March 11 in the 11 a.m. game against the winner of the No. 8-No. 9 game on March 10. Other probable games times, assuming Illinois would continue to win in the tourney, would be at 12:40 p.m. on March 12 and at 2:30 p.m. on March 13 for the championship.

[Greg Taylor]

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