Not Qualified To Comment » Illini set Record for Awfulness*

Illini set Record for Awfulness*

February 19, 2009 at 10:00 am | College Basketball, Illinois, Uncategorized
By: StevieY19

*may be false

If they didn’t it was damn close. Illinois had an awful night shooting the basketball, making just 15 of its 50 shots. In a contest between Illinois shooting regular shots and me shooting free throws with my left foot, it would not be a blowout.

The first half saw Illinois score 15 points, but it couldn’t get worse than that in the second half, right? It didn’t get worse, but things didn’t get much better as the Illini followed up with 18 points for a total of 33 points. I bet that girls basketball team that lost 100-0 has scored 33 points in a game this season!

Sometimes when your shots aren’t falling, it’s nice to take a trip to the free throw line to find your rhythm, but the Illini went to the charity stripe a total of zero times. Zero! None of those 35 misses involved some contact on the shot? Damn.

At least that means free throws were the only shots Illinois couldn’t manage to miss. Layups, jumpers, threes, layups….they missed them all. Of course when you lose like this, the stats abound such as the lowest scoring game since Monmouth beat Princeton 41-21 in 2005; you remember that Monmouth defense! It was the first time in the 46 year history of Assembly Hall that one team failed to shoot a free throw.

When Illinois and Penn State met in football this year, the two teams combined for just seven points less than the basketball teams. Zook’s team managed to put up more than 33 points four times.

Anyway, that’s it for the bad stats. Illinois actually held a seven point lead with just over six minutes to go, but the Nittany Lions ended the game on a 14-2 run to steal the game. The loss comes at a terrible time for Illinois with Michigan State losing Tuesday night. A regular season Big Ten Championship seems unlikely now, but the Illini have to get it together to secure the best seeds possible for both the Big Ten Tournament and the Big Dance. A win at Ohio State on Sunday would be a nice step in the right direction.