Category: Big Ten

Land-o-Links – 5/10/2006

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Illinois Fighting Illini, Land-o-Links, Random Thoughts, SportsLeave a comment

The links are University of Illinois-centric today – there just happen to be a number of news items out there (nothing about Chief Illiniwek here, although I'll tackle that at some point):

1) U. of I. Admission About to Get Harder for Residents – It's really interesting to see how efforts to make the University of Illinois into a more selective and elite institution seems to be thought of as a bad thing. At least that's the impression that I got from today's front page Chicago Tribune article. Of course, they just interviewed complaining high school students, parents, and counselors while not bothering to talk to a single U of I alum or current student. I understand the dilemma here, where the academic goals of a public university might run counter to the notion that it's supposed to provide a taxpayer-supported service to in-state residents.

However, as an alum, I want Illinois to be perceived nationally to be at the same level as Michigan and Berkeley. In order to achieve that, Chancellor Herman's initiative to bring in more out-of-state and international students is necessary. Wisconsin is an example of a public school that has been beating us in that regard and it's reflected in our Big Ten rival to the north consistently being rated higher than us in the U.S. News rankings. The quality of our faculty and the GPA and test score numbers of our students are right in line with both Michigan and Wisconsin, yet the biggest difference is that those other two schools draw a large percentage of high quality out-of-state students, particularly from the East Coast, while our student body has consisted of over 90% Illinois residents for quite awhile. If we only draw people from a single region, we're going to be perceived as a regional school.

2) Eighth Annual ACC/Big Ten Challenge Matchups – Is it too early to start thinking about college basketball again? I don't think so. We get a home date with Maryland on Tuesday, November 28th, which should be a pretty good matchup. The Ohio State-UNC game on November 29th, though, will probably be the top non-conference meeting of the year.

3) Illini Ponder Chicago Tournament – More basketball: Illinois might set up their own basketball tournament to take place over Thanksgiving weekend at the new arena being built in Hoffman Estates.

And finally…

4) The World's Best University – A little pep-talk from a guy graduating this year that points out one of the things I loved about attending Illinois: balance.

Who Do You Root For? The Choice is Yours… or Not.

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, NFL Football, Sports6 Comments

If you've read "Now I Can Die in Peace" by Bill Simmons (ESPN.com's Sports Guy), he has a list of rules in the book's introduction on how and when you can be a fan of a sports team. Essentially, you need to cheer for the teams in the region that you grew up in (for college sports, you or your parents need to be alums or you grew up in a town or region where college sports dominated the scene) or the teams that your parents that transplanted from or went to school elsewhere raised you to root for unless your favorite team relocates to another city (or, as in the case of the Blackhawks, the team's owner destroys all will of the fan base completely). Dan Shanoff, also from ESPN.com, has some more flexible rules regarding how you can pick a team (such as "fan-in-law" status by marriage – I don't know if I buy that one). Finally, Minnesota Red Sox broached the subject of raising your child as a fan of a team other than your own in order to avoid constant heartbreak (great article, although Minnesota Red Sox must freely admit that he broke a number of the Sports Guy's rules, such as committing "sports bigamy" by being a diehard fan of both the Cubs and Red Sox along with having to answer questions from a higher power at the pearly gates in the future as to how he could ever, ever, ever cheer for the Packers after being raised in Chicago).

I tend to agree with the more restrictive tenets set forth by the Sports Guy. It's one thing to jump on the bandwagon of a great story, such as the Red Sox comeback in 2004 or George Mason this year, but a person should only be a true fan of one team for every sport. For me, it's the Fighting Illini, Bears, White Sox, and Bulls. There are other teams that I follow with a lot of interest, such as DePaul and the Cubs, but make no mistake about it – there will never, ever be an instance where my rooting interests aren't 100% clear if any of those two teams meet. I spent three years in law school at DePaul and want the Blue Demons to do well, but if Illinois ever plays them in basketball, every ounce of me will be cheering for the Illini.

What infuriates me are sports cherrypickers. For instance, I read a Steve Rosenbloom interview with Penny Marshall a few months ago where she expressed how she is a diehard fan of both the Yankees and the Lakers. Jack Nicholson and a host of other celebrities claim to have the same loyalties. This is why half of America believes that Hollywood doesn't have a soul. Certainly, it doesn't have a sports soul when its citizens pick the two most powerful franchises in sports to root for that, by the way, are located on opposite ends of the country. It's like rooting for both Hitler and Stalin. That's just sickening.

Almost as bad is our favorite Duke apologist Dick Vitale also being honored as an honorary alum of Notre Dame as well as being a season ticketholder for Irish football games. A Duke basketball/Notre Dame football fan – could you imagine anyone being more insufferable? At least Dicky V has somewhat of an excuse since he's sent his kids to Notre Dame. In his aforementioned column, Shanoff states that a parent that spends $40,000-plus per year sending a kid to a school gives that parent every right to cheer for that school. Considering that tuition for a year at Notre Dame could buy me White Sox season tickets for the next 40 years, I'll side with Shanoff on this one. Still, just the thought of a Duke/Notre Dame combo gives me the heebie-jeebies.

I'll grant that there are large sections of this country that might not have a natural rooting interest dictated by geography or people that went to schools that either don't have sports teams or don't care about sports. So, at first, I thought that those people could be entitled to a "team draft" of sorts, where they could pick teams to root for but couldn't get greedy. For instance, if I'm a person that lives in North Dakota, I could root for the Yankees, but since I picked such a dominant baseball, I would need to take, say, the Arizona Cardinals as my football team. That would ensure that evil combos such as the Yankee/Laker fan wouldn't become a nationwide epidemic.

As I started thinking about it more, however, it became clear to me that there are just certain teams that no one should ever cheer for unless there is some type of geographic/family/alumni connection. Here's my top ten list counting down in reverse order:

10) New York Knicks – Every year, teams vie for the ESPY Award for The Most Putrid Team That Sportscenter Pays Way Too Much Attention To. We've had a banner year in this category, with the top contenders being the Eagles ("T.O. is selfish, crazy, and wants to get paid? This calls for a breaking Sportscenter Update!"), Cubs ("Prior and Wood are both hurt at the same time? I haven't heard that one before!"), and Lakers ("From an unconfirmed source, Shaq reportedly said he saw Kobe and R. Kelly handing out room keys at the Brookwood Junior High graduation dance"). Unfortunately for all of these teams, the Knicks have captured this award for the 57th year in a row, which just happens to be how long the NBA and its New York franchise have been in existence.

9) Indiana Hoosiers – If you went to a different Big Ten college, you don't need any explanation. If you didn't go to a Big Ten college, all you need to know is that they're evil.

8) Michigan Wolverines – See #9 above.

7) San Francisco Giants – This doesn't have anything to do with the franchise itself, which has blessed baseball fans with Bobby Thompson's "Shot Heard 'Round the World" and Willie Mays. The Giants are here simply because of the "Despicable Athlete" exemption (other qualifiers from the past and present: any team with Terrell Owens or Bill Laimbeer), although Bay Area fans seriously need to get some perspective. I know all about blindly cheering for your team, but c'mon, folks, this is beyond being in denial.

6) Dallas Cowboys – Honestly, I really don't care about T.O. that much – he just seems to be a common thread on this list so far. With or without T.O., however, the Cowboys would be high on this list one way or another as a carryover from their high-minded attitude during their dominance in the 1990s. Now, with T.O. plus Bill Parcells, the Cowboys might become the foremost challenger the Knicks have ever had to that ESPY Award described in #10 above (as long as Isiah Thomas is at the helm, though, put your money on the Knicks).

5) USC Trojans – If you skimmed the top 1% of the Laker fan base in terms of income and snobbiness, you'd be left with USC supporters. In addition, have I told you how much I hate their fight song? For some reason, the average person on the street believes that the USC Trojan Marching Band is an elite group since they appeared on some televised Fleetwood Mac concert a few years ago. Rest assured, I heard them play that goddamned fight song live for four hours straight at the first college football game I ever went to in Champaign – they royally suck. Of course, I'll be the first to admit that it would have been a ridiculous amount of fun to go to school there.

4) Notre Dame Fighting Irish – To me, just because you're Irish Catholic doesn't mean that you've got to worship the Golden Dome (which seems to be common refrain here in Chicago). Now, I'll grant Irish fans that going to a game is quite an experience for any sports fan. It's a beautiful campus and seeing Touchdown Jesus on gameday is spectacular. In general, however, if you took away the nice weather, attractive women, and recent national success from their rivals at USC but raised the pompous arrogance up a notch commiserate with having a contract with N(D)BC, you'd end up with Notre Dame.

3) Los Angeles Lakers – All of the other teams on this list do have one admirable thing in common: they've got rabid fans that would die for their teams (even if they are annoyingly insufferable). Lakers fans, however, are without question has the biggest bandwagon jumping fan base of any franchise in sports. The beautiful celebrities show up for games in droves when the Lakers are winning and flee for better clubbing atmospheres when they're losing. The Lakers would be #1 on this list if their fans weren't so pathetic.

2) New York Yankees – In the Sports Guy's book, he noted that one his favorite emails of all-time from a reader stated the following: "Rooting for the Yankees is like rooting for the house in blackjack." Absolutely perfect.

1) Duke Blue Devils – A combination of all of the worst traits of the aforementioned rest of the top 4: the Borg-like perfection/conformity of the Yankees, the loudmouthed and spoiled fan base of Notre Dame, and the bandwagon backers of the Lakers. Coach K doesn't consider himself a basketball coach that happens to be a leader; Coach K considers himself a leader that happens to coach the team that no one anywhere should ever cheer for (unless they fall into one of the exceptions and even those people are suspect) if they have a sports soul.

A Tradition Unlike Any Other: Frank the Tank’s Random Weekend Thoughts

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Cubs, Chicago White Sox, Golf, Illinois Fighting Illini, Major League Baseball, NBA Basketball, Random Thoughts, Sports2 Comments

Random sports thoughts from the weekend:

1) Lefty Again – I was perplexed for a moment when I thought I saw Hootie Johnson, Jim Nantz, and Tiger Woods present the Green Jacket to Bartolo Colon in the Butler Cabin, but then I realized it was just Phil Mickelson. Seriously though, it was amazing to see Mickelson, who two years ago was golf's version of the Chicago Cubs, turn in such a dominating performance yesterday with a leaderboard filled with Tiger, Vijay Singh, Fred Couples, Retief Goosen, and Jose Maria Olazabel (one of the most underrated athletes in any sport) right behind him. The two best things about the Masters: (1) only 4 commercial breaks per hour with a limit of 2 commercials during each break and (2) when CBS jumps to "bonus coverage" of another hole, there isn't a shot of a coach taking a timeout to immediately go into another commercial break. As a result, I watched about 12 hours of golf this past weekend and the answer to your question is yes, I have no life.

2) Badgers and the Frozen Four – After watching Wisconsin beat Boston College in the Frozen Four to win the national championship in front of a virtual home crowd in Milwaukee, I believe that it's time for Illinois to make the leap to NCAA Division I hockey. One of these days, I'll write a long-winded and detailed rant on "How Bill Wirtz Fucked Up with Frank the Tank" explaining why I'm not an NHL fan and how the Blackhawks are dead to me, but when I was in college, going to Illini club hockey games was one of one of my favorite things to do on campus. Even though Illinois just had a club-level team, all of the games were packed with fans. Considering how popular the hockey teams are at the other Big Ten schools that have Division I programs, that hockey is typically the only sport other than football and men's basketball that consistently turns a profit for athletic departments, and the Assembly Hall can be turned into a rink for games, this seems to be a no-brainer for Illinois (although it seems that the rest of college hockey is petrified of the Big Ten forming its own hockey conference).

3) WTF, Bulls?! – The Bulls suffocated the Sixers last week in Philadelphia and the Sixers were reeling from losing another game on Friday night, so it would seem that the Bulls were destined to take a 2-game lead over Philly for the last Eastern Conference playoff spot on Saturday night in the rubber match in the comforts of the United Center, right? Well, I'll need to check the box score again to confirm this, but I believe that Allen Iverson made 5,000 straight jumpers along with 4,000 free throws in the third quarter while the Bulls shot 1-out-of-10,000,000. Believe me, if you think those numbers are bad, it looked a lot worse watching it live. So, there's now a tie for the last playoff spot with the Bulls needing to play the super-hot Nets on Tuesday. Just awful.

4) How Long is the Grace Period for the White Sox? – The Sox dropped 2 out of 3 to the Royals, which up until last week, when Kansas City voters passed a tax referendum to renovate Kauffman Stadium, was Candidate #1 of MLB Teams That Need to Move to Las Vegas. Supposedly, we're only one week into a five-year moratorium on complaining about a team after they've won a championship. Is everyone sure it isn't supposed to be a five-week moratorium instead?

5) Cubs – Cards vs. Yankees – Red Sox – Here's what I believe is the primary difference between Cubs – Cardinals rivalry and the Yankees – Red Sox rivalry (besides the "small" factor of actually winning the World Series recently): While the Cards could be equated with the Yankees in terms of success compared to their respective rivals, I've never met a Chicagoan that actually would ever willingly move to St. Louis (I'm not talking about heading to Wash U for college for 4 years – I mean permanent residence). I know I wouldn't. In contrast, the bemoaning of the constant failures of the Red Sox (up until 2004, of course) was an extension of the overall inferiority complex that Bostonians feel toward New York City. So, what's worse? Is it the Chicagoan that looks down upon St. Louis as an inferior city yet the Cubs maddeningly don't have anywhere near the history of success of their rube rivals (in football terms, subsitute "St. Louis" with "Green Bay" here)? Or is it the Bostonian that consistently feels inferior on both fronts? I'll leave you with that thought on your Monday morning.

The Mason Midmajor Myth

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, Sports2 Comments

Monday's national championship game between Flordida and UCLA was quite possibly the worst final I've ever seen. The UConn shellacking of Georgia Tech in 2004 was up there on the anti-entertainment scale as well, but at least I knew the Huskies were putting on a preview of things to come in the NBA with Emeka Okafor and Ben Gordon on the floor. There's a lot of potential with the guys on both Florida and UCLA, but certainly no locks for future stardom.

Thus, the focus for my last college basketball post of the season is to address the monolithic groupthink that has permeated the sports world since George Mason made it to the Final Four. The overwhelming view right now is that George Mason's NCAA Tournament run is going to change everything for midmajor schools and that Billy Packer ought to be hung in effigy for his ignorance. However, as the Sports Guy would say in paraphrasing the Wolf from “Pulp Fiction”, let's not start sucking each other's you-know-whats just yet.

As I wrote last week, George Mason's Final Four berth is the most improbable sports achievement I've witnessed in my lifetime and I outlined exactly why. I'm not sure how so many analysts all of the sudden believe that the preponderance of the evidence showing the major conferences (and the BCS conferences in particular) dominating the NCAA Tournament when it comes to the Final Four are suddenly going to be thrown by the wayside. There's a reason why the appearance of George Mason was such a major story: this was an aberration rather than a sign of things to come. This isn't the rant of a Big Ten snob. Quite to the contrary, let's think about this rationally from (1) a talent perspective and (2) how the college sports business works.

The talent gap between the majors and midmajors is going to widen again next year with the new rule preventing prep players from entering the NBA Draft until one year after they graduate from high school. Every single one of those players who would have skipped college to go to the pros will be heading to major programs. Even though this doesn't eradicate the prospect of college players leaving early for the NBA Draft, which is the area that majors suffer more from than the midmajors, a team is still better off with top flight underclassmen a la Syracuse's Carmelo Anthony in 2003 or Florida's Joakim Noah this year than a group of mid-level seniors when it comes to winning national championships. So, I doubt that the midmajors are really going to make headway when the majors are going to get their biggest talent infusion in a generation over the next few years.

At the same time, the rise of George Mason isn't going to do anything to alter the non-conference scheduling by the majors. George Mason might become one of a tiny handful of midmajors other than Gonzaga to regularly obtain home-and-home series with high majors, but the business of college sports dictates that fortune of those schools won't spread to their fellow midmajors. For example, Illinois typically schedules 2 true road games per year (Illinois playing "at" UIC at the United Center or Indiana playing "at" Butler at the Conseco Fieldhouse are anything but true road games), one of which is a return game for a team that they had invited previously to the United Center (typically an ACC, Pac-10, or SEC team) and the other usually being an ACC-Big Ten Challenge game. Is Illinois going to (a) give up a revenue producing home game to play a midmajor on the road or (b) replace a road game against an ACC-type team with a midmajor team? There's no way that the Illini would ever take either if those options. Even worse from the midmajor perspective, Illinois is typically one of the more aggresive schedulers of the top programs. Teams such as Syracuse and UConn often go through their entire non-conference slates playing only one or even zero true road games. The point is that the major conference schools go on the road sparingly, and when they do, they want to play other major conference schools.

As a result, I don't believe all the hype about the sea-change about to come for the midmajors. In fact, it's extremely likely that the majors will be more powerful next season. There's a reason why the story of Norman Dale and Hickory High was made into the movie “Hoosiers”: it was a once-in-a-lifetime event. The George Mason run is a great story that is going to be on that mythical level, as well, because it's not going to happen again for a long time.

Bucky, the Pink Line, Kelvin, and the Final Four

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, Music, Pop Culture, Random Thoughts, Sports, Television2 Comments

Some random thoughts for your Final Four weekend:

1) Bucky Survives and Advances – Forget about Presidential elections. What terrifies me about the voting patterns of the Red States is that Bucky Covington could very well be our next American Idol. If you've watched this season at all and have any discernible taste in music (or just an appreciation of proper intonation), you know exactly what I'm talking about. Not only did he not finish in the bottom 3 this week, but next week everyone has to sing country songs (looks like I'll be just tuning in for the results show), which plays right into Bucky's Southern Strategy. We can't let this happen. Vote or die, people!

2) The Pink Line – I seriously thought the Chicago Tribune was pulling an early April Fool's joke on us with this morning's front page article. Unfortunately, every time I set the bar lower for the CTA, they manage to limbo right under there.

3) Kelvin Sampson Hired at IU – The only thing more surprising than the announcement of Sampson's hiring at Indiana is the tepid response of Hoosier fans. As I said before, IU fans were expecting Coach K to drop everything, move to Bloomington, and bring along Phil Jackson and Pat Riley as his assistants. Notwithstanding the ignorance of its fan base, I believe that Indiana made a great hire and he was certainly as close to the top of the coaching mountain as the school could reasonably attain.

Take this from an Illini guy who was hoping that IU would screw up and bow to nepotistic pressure to hire within the “Indiana Family” a la Steve Alford (or the gold standard of Isiah Thomas): anyone that argues that Indiana should have hired Alford over Sampson is insane. Sampson has proven he can win lots of games and recruit great talent at the basketball backwaters of Pullman and Norman. It's interesting to note that the Hoosier fans that are most critical of the baggage regarding Sampson's calls to recruits are pretty much the same people that vehemently defended a coach that choked his players. Seems just a little bit hypocritical for them to pull out the "integrity" card, no?

All in all, Kelvin Sampson is a great fit for Indiana and is going to provide some tough competition on the floor and on the recruiting trails in the Big Ten. Indiana fans ought to thank their lucky stars they got this good of a coach.

4) Final Four Predictions – I'm not betting against George Mason anymore – I'm a believer. So, I'm going with George Mason over Florida and UCLA over LSU in the semifinals.

Have a great weekend!

NCAA Tournament Picks and Land-o-Links – 3/23/2006

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, Chicago Bears, College Basketball, Land-o-Links, NFL Football, Random Thoughts, SportsLeave a comment

My quick picks for tonight’s NCAA Tournament games are all chalk: Memphis over Bradley (although I’m proud of the Braves, the Tigers have too much firepower), Duke over LSU (probably will be a really close game), Texas over West Virginia (no longer will “Pittsnogle” be used as a verb in basketball), UCLA over Gonzaga (I will continue to pick Gonzaga to lose and call them overrated until the basketball gods rightfully bounce such an atrocious defensive team – they are the college version of the Dallas Mavericks).

Now, on to today’s links:

1) 2007 TV Rights Are On Big Ten’s Mind – Could Fox pay the Big Ten enough money to get the conference to abandon ESPN? I don’t care what the price is – leaving ESPN for more money would be fool’s gold for the Big Ten. The fact that no one outside of the Pacific time zone sees Pac-10 games has less to do with geography and more because none of their games are on ESPN. Plenty of hoops junkies have seen West Coast-based mid-major conferences such as the Mountain West, WCC, and Big West as a result of ESPN’s Big Monday. According to Teddy Greenstein, it looks like the Big Ten is going to do the right thing in the end and stay put.

2) Soap and the Campus: A Web-Site Spoof Succeeds – Have you ever met someone who went to Boston College? The old joke about them rings true: they think they’re Harvard in academics and Notre Dame in football. That’s a lot of bluster from a school that’s tied with our fair University of Illinois in the latest U.S. News rankings.

3) First Stadiums, Now Teams Take a Corporate Identity – If the MLS expands to Milwaukee, you know that the team must be called Milwaukee’s Best. There’s no other choice.

4) Chicago Parking Map – For those of you who can’t find a free parking space on the street and are willing to just give up and pay up, this should be a useful tool.

5) Signing New QB Should Have Been a Brees – I know that (a) Brian Griese isn’t exactly an addition to the Bears that makes my heart flutter and (b) complaining that Jay Mariotti is nuts is sort of like complaining that Chicago has corrupt politicians – it sucks but it’s never going to change. Still, what exactly were people expecting out of the Bears? It was a reasonable demand for the Bears to go out and get a solid backup quarterback, which is what they did in this situation by signing Griese. The Bears had as much of a chance of nabbing Drew Brees or Daunte Culpepper as the White Sox and Cubs had of trading for A-Rod a couple of years ago. Maybe I’m so happy to see that the Bears were proactive on the QB front for once that it’s coloring my thought process, but my gut reaction is that Mariotti needs to stop whining.

Melancholy End to the Illini Season and Looking Toward the Future

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, SportsLeave a comment

The fact that Illinois failed to get to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament after falling to Washington on Saturday was disappointing but not surprising. All this season, the Illini have been inconsistent on a game-to-game basis. It certainly wasn’t shocking to see us have an up-and-down game against a talented Washington team.

The tough thing about the aftermath of this loss is that we’re going to have to seriously dial back our expectations next season. From the moment after we lost to Duke in the Sweet Sixteen 2 years ago, we believed immediately that we would be national championship contenders in 2004-05 (and that proved to be correct). Last year, we at least had the satisfaction of making the Final Four and the national championship game while we could look forward to a solid, if not dominating, season with Dee Brown and James Augustine coming back.

Now, however, with Brown and Augustine having played their last game with the Illini, we don’t really know what to expect (as the Chicago Tribune pointed out a couple of days ago). We know that 2007-08 is going to be a resurgent year for Illinois with a banner recruiting class already in place featuring Eric Gordon, Bill Cole, and Mike Tisdale (and hopefully Illinois state champion Simeon guard Derrick Rose will join them). But that’s two years down the line. What is next year going to look like?

The best case scenario would be a performance similar to this year’s Ohio State team. A lot of Buckeye fans were looking past this season toward the ridiculous recruiting class starting in 2006-07 led by superstar center Greg Oden. However, the 2005-06 Ohio State team gave their fan base a lot to cheer for immediately by winning the Big Ten title outright. Considering how well Brian Randle, Shaun Pruitt, and Jamar Smith developed over the last 2 months of this season and the addition of another top big man in recruit Brian Carwell, the Illini could be pretty good shape to contend for the top of the Big Ten again.

Anyone who follows the Illini, however, can also envision the worst case scenario. The makeup of the Illinois team next season is going to be 180-degree turn from what we had in 2005. We’re going to have great size with Pruitt, Carwell, and Randle, which is positive. However, we’re also going to go from having three NBA-caliber guards that could all bring the ball up the court in 2005 to not knowing if we have anyone that can be counted on to be the primary ballhandler in 2006-07. When success in college basketball and, in particular, the NCAA Tournament is predicated on having strong guards, this is a scary situation for Illinois next season. Jamar Smith is as accurate of a jump-shooter as you’ll ever see, but he seems more suited to being a wing player that can spot up along the arc. The same thing can be said of Rich McBride. Chester Frazier received some playing time as a point guard this season, but he has yet to demonstrate that he can run the motion offense at the high level that we’ve become accustomed to seeing in Champaign. With all of this in mind, merely making the NCAA Tournament won’t be a given with this team next year.

My feeling is that we’re going to be closer to the best case scenario than the worst case scenario because of one overriding factor: Bruce Weber. As a coach, he may not have the smooth recruiting skills of Bill Self or the endorsement potential of Mike Kryzewski, but when it comes to Xs-and-Os, Weber is as good as they come. There were plenty of preseason observers that didn’t think Illinois would make the NCAA Tournament this year after losing Deron Williams, Luther Head, and Roger Powell, but the Illini ended up having a solid season (even if it did end on a sour note). A lot of coaches are fine when they have their own system in place and have the personnel to fit into that system, yet are at a loss when the makeup of the team changes. What Weber proved he could do this season is that he could adjust his system to the players that he had. The motion offense last season relied on perimeter play from Williams, Head, and Brown. By the end of this season, Weber adjusted the system so that the big men Augustine and Pruitt would be the focus of the offense. This will become more important next season as Illinois will need to rely even more on its frontcourt players.

2007-08 is the beacon of light for the Illinois basketball program right now. Before we look too far ahead, however, here’s to hoping that next season gives us some unexpected positive surprises.

Illinois is a More Balanced Sports School Than People Think

On By Frank the TankIn Big Ten, College Basketball, College Football, Illinois Fighting Illini, Sports2 Comments

Tom Dienhart of the Sporting News wrote a post on his blog listing out all of the BCS conference schools and determining whether each one is a basketball school or a football school. He categorized Illinois as a basketball school, but said, “The Whiz Kid and Flyin’ Illini trump Butkus and Halas – barely.”

I note this because, for once, an observer that didn’t attend the University of Illinois actually nailed this right on the head – kudos to Dienhart for this. Most people outside of Illini Nation seem to automatically assume that Illinois is strictly a basketball school that doesn’t care about football. This isn’t an unreasonable premonition considering that Illinois has had one of most successful basketball programs in the country over the past decade while the football program has been correspondingly awful.

However, I’ve had to explain many times to others that Illinois isn’t anything like its Big Ten neighbor Indiana, where football season is considered a mild diversion until Midnight Madness. We do care about football and we do go to games. Is the passion for football in Champaign equal to what one would witness at Michigan, Ohio State, or Notre Dame? Certainly not, but remember that there are only a handful of schools across the country that come anywhere close to the high levels of consistent football support seen at those schools.

My point is that no one should assume that Illinois is just a basketball school. We love the basketball program dearly and it’s definitely been the main generator of excitement for alums and those on campus for quite awhile. However, we also deeply want the football program to get back into the upper echelon of the Big Ten and finally win some Rose Bowls again. Unlike the Hoosiers, Jayhawks, or Blue Devils, it’s in the DNA of Illini Nation to truly care about the state of the football team. Hopefully, we’ll be rewarded with some gridiron success soon to match our prowess on the hardwood court.

Jamar Smith is the Illini Bomb Squad

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, SportsLeave a comment

That was a really weird scene at the beginning of the Illinois – Air Force game last night when there was hardly anyone besides the teams’ pep bands in the arena at tip-off because the game’s ticketholders hadn’t been let in yet. This was a result of a food cart that some bomb-sniffing dogs thought was suspicious. It looked like the Illini and Falcons were playing an intramural game at IMPE.

Anyway, when the crowd finally filed in, everyone was treated to Air Force’s Princeton offense that maddeningly produced wide open three-point shots for them. Fortunately, the Illini were able to counter with Jamar Smith’s own long-range capabilities to win 78-69 and advance to a tough second-round date with the Washington Huskies on Saturday. Some takes on last night’s game:

1) Big Ten Wonk – Noted that the score was particularly high considering that Air Force aims to slow down the game to where the score is as low as possible.

2) Rick Morrissey (Chicago Tribune) – Description of the weird circumstances all around with the game.

3) Jay Mariotti (Chicago Sun-Times) – Points out that the Illini need to get more scoring from their entire group if they want to advance.

4) Wayne Drehs (ESPN.com) – Nice ESPN review of Jamar Smith’s performance last night.

5) Bryan Burwell (St. Louis Post-Dispatch) – Illini Nation has reason to smile a little bit.

As for the rest of the NCAA Tournament field, I hope you listened to me regarding Syracuse – Texas A&M and ignored me on the Orange’s fellow Big East washouts Seton Hall and Marquette. San Diego State was hitting everything last night; fortunately for Indiana, the Aztecs couldn’t play defense. Out of all the upcoming second round matchups on Saturday, I’m most sure of the Hoosiers taking out Gonzaga. The Bulldogs’ struggles against Xavier yesterday weren’t an accident – Gonzaga is one of the most overrated teams I’ve seen in a long time.

Enjoy the games this weekend and GO ILLINI!

2006 NCAA Tournament Predictions: Texas Two-Step

On By Frank the TankIn Big East, Big Ten, College Basketball, Illinois Fighting Illini, SportsLeave a comment

(3/12/07 UPDATE: If you’re looking for predictions for the 2007 NCAA Tournament, click here.) 

I fill out several brackets every year to cover my bases (including the obligatory “Delusional Illini Fan” bracket with Illinois going all the way for the championship), but here’s how I really think this season’s NCAA Tournament is going to shape up:

1) ATLANTA REGION

a) Teams With No Buzz That Can Surprise – Texas A&M, George Washington

b) Team With Lots of Buzz That Can Disappoint – Syracuse

c) Regional Final Prediction – Texas over Duke

2) OAKLAND REGION

a) Teams With No Buzz That Can Surprise – Indiana, Xavier, Marquette

b) Team With Lots of Buzz That Can Disappoint – Gonzaga

c) Regional Final Prediction – Kansas over Indiana (I can’t tell you how mortifying it is for me to pick such a matchup but I’ve got to put personal differences aside)

3) WASHINGTON REGION

a) Teams With No Buzz That Can Surprise – Illinois (before you call me a homer, we have the best shot to beat UConn of anyone in this region – I’m not saying that it will happen, as you can see in my Regional Final prediction below, but we’re going to be a tough out), Michigan State, Seton Hall

b) Team With Lots of Buzz That Can Disappoint – North Carolina

c) Regional Final Prediction – UConn over Michigan State

4) MINNEAPOLIS REGION

a) Teams With No Buzz That Can Surprise – Florida, Nevada, Wisconsin

b) Team With Lots of Buzz That Can Disappoint – Boston College

c) Regional Final Prediction – Ohio State over Villanova

5) FINAL FOUR PREDICTIONS

Texas over Kansas, UConn over Ohio State

6) NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME PREDICTION

I predicted the Texas upset over USC in the Rose Bowl for the football national championship a few months ago, so I’m going all-in for the Longhorns this year. On top of that, remember that Texas also won the College World Series last June.  I’m calling Texas over UConn to cement the greatest sports year that any single school could possibly have.

The start of the first round is only a couple of hours away. Merry Christmas in March, everyone!