 And who could blame them?After all they had watched as a 10-point
Cats lead late in the first half slowly and quite hideously
dissolved in front of their eyes because of a 9-points-in-19-minutes
dry spell.
And with less than two minutes remaining, the Illini, boosted by
a large group of orange-clad fans, looked pretty comfortable with
its 9-point lead.
But in a contest that never really made any sense it only figured
that this one would come down to one final desperate shot.
It got to that point thanks to consecutive 3-pointers by
Northwestern's Alex Marcotullio and John Shurna to close the gap,
and a layup by Drew Crawford with 15 seconds remaining that erased
it altogether.
If Jack Buck still were around he would not have believed what he
was seeing -- and he wouldn't have been alone.
With just six seconds left, Illinois' Myke Henry went to the line
to shoot a pair of free throws. He made the first but missed the
second and Crawford grabbed the rebound and headed downcourt for the
potential game-winner.
Unfortunately for him, waiting at the other end was 7-foot-1
center Meyers Leonard, who swatted away the shot and all hopes of a
miraculous Northwestern comeback as Illinois hung on for a 57-56
victory.
"Any win in the Big Ten is a good win, and it being a road win
and to find a way to win a close game is great," Illinois coach
Bruce Weber said. "The whole game we talked about playing with
emotion, playing with a motor.
"We had a great finish to the first half, which allowed us to
stay in the game, and then a great start of the second half -- we
haven't been good at either one of those things."
They sure were Wednesday, and Leonard's last-second swat was the
capper on a feel-good night for the Illini (13-3, 2-1), who snapped
a four-game road slide in conference play.
[to top of second column] |
"Coach Weber took me off the line; he probably knew they were
going to go in transition, just go to the bucket -- so that was a
good move on his part," Leonard said. "This time I kind of read it,
knew (Crawford) was going to put it up, and got the block."
"It's a tough loss," Crawford said, "especially after making that
sort of a comeback at the end of the game."
Shurna carried Northwestern (11-4, 1-2) in the first half with 17
points but was shut out in the second until hitting a 3 in the final
minutes.
"I challenged our guys to cover Shurna in the second half," Weber
said. "We did a great job."
"They played us pretty hard in the second half," Shurna admitted.
"But I just missed
[Associated Press,
MIKE SPELLMAN]
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or
redistributed.
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