Evan Turner Must Be Stopped, And I Know Just The Team To Do It

I don't know how he's going to do it, but Bruce Weber must find a way to stop Evan Turner tonight.

Last year, I'd say that Bruce should just dial up some Chester Frazier action and call it a night. But this year? Yikes. I don't know what to do.

D.J. Richardson is probably the team's best perimeter defender, but he's only a freshman. Demetri McCamey is Turner's peer in many ways - most notably because the two were high school teammates - but I'll be darned if he can D up Evan for 40 minutes.

What about the Richwoods beast, Billy Cole? I don't see it happening.

Maybe Weber goes all postmodern tonight and lets Evan get his points and rebounds, but has Mike Tisdale, Mike Davis and the rest of the boys lock down the Dieblers, the Bufords, the Lightys and the Lauderdales of the world. Easier said than done, no doubt, but still perhaps a more manageable task than shutting down the probable National Player of the Year.

Whatever will be, will be. The Illini need this game. Badly.

Game on tonight at 9 PM EST.

Worst Home Loss For Illini Since 1976, i.e. Since Before I Was Born

I was going to lead this post with the statement that Sunday's 72-53 loss to Ohio St. was the worst Illini home loss of the Bruce Weber era. That is, until I read Mark Tupper's blog post last night and realized it was not just the worst home loss of the Weber era, but the worst Illini home loss since January 1976.

Holy Lou Henson!

That's not a good way to start the stretch run of the Big Ten schedule.

I came away with a couple competing thoughts from the game. On the one hand, after watching Ohio St.'s performance against the Illini, I'd venture that they are a national title contender. They have an extremely talented starting five and, with the possible exception of a matchup against John Wall and Kentucky, will have the best player on the court no matter who they play (that would be Evan Turner for those lucky enough not to have watched Sunday's game). If David Lighty and Jon Diebler are hitting shots and making dagger plays like they did Sunday, and it is conceivable they could go on a run of 4 or 5 or 6 games playing as well as they did Sunday, and Dallas Lauderdale continues to man up in the post and snag rebounds and putbacks, I'd put this Ohio St. squad up against anyone.

On the other hand, Illinois played Sunday's game like my Grandma's rec league team (note: my Grandma doesn't even have a rec league team). I'm pretty sure I, like Jon Diebler, would have hit 6 of 11 threes against that threadbare Illini perimeter defense. Not to mention that not one Illini could make a shot on the offensive end. Demetri, D.J. Richardson and Chris Paul made it look like Thad Matta invented the 1-3-1 defense minutes before the game. News flash: there's a reason not many teams play a 1-3-1 zone ... and that reason is it has wholesale weaknesses against strong guards who can push the ball up the court, swing it around the perimeter and either find a big man on the weak side post or hit an open shot resulting from a late-rotating defender.

But I'll give credit to Matta and the Ohio St. players. They took advantage of the freshmen Illini guards and schooled them.

My only hope is that Ohio St. used up its juice in this more or less meaningless game and now the Illini can learn from the loss and bring the fury in their next meeting.

McCamey v. Turner: Cage Match

Oh man, that was a choice win over Wisconsin last Tuesday. Bo Ryan's squad had never lost a home game to an unranked team during his tenure. Not only that, he's now only lost 6 home games to Big Ten teams in 10 years - 3 of those losses have been to the Illini.

Our boy Demetri was once again a huge part of the Illini victory. He was 11-17 from the field for 27 points, including 3 of 4 from beyond the arc. He added 7 assists because, at bottom, he is a generous guy.

Today will be an equally dangerous test for the Illini. McCamey will lead the Illini against his old high school cohort, and current National Player of the Year Candidate, Evan Turner.

No doubt Evan Turner is strong with the force, but McCamey has been an absolue Jedi lately.

Tip-off in Champaign in about 5 minutes.