Last spring, Josh Whitman drew the ire of many Illini fans by pointing out that evaluating a basketball coach based on the NCAAs isn't the best way of determining what you have. There was a pretty negative response from fans that Whitman was excusing Brad Underwood's three years (2021-23) of NCAA underperformance. Personally, I found this fan response a bit off, in part because Whitman is right, much of how a coach does in the NCAAs isn't a function of the coach's quality but instead external factors like the difficulty of one's draw. For people who don't like Underwood (and there were more in spring 2023 than there is today), this was the one argument that could be made against him.
As a quick aside, I do agree with fan sentiment that the NCAAs are most important. College hoops is about March, but it's not a great determiner of what quality coach you have (see the total randomness of Bill Self's NCAA history for Exhibit A, and at this moment Self is probably the best active coach in CBB based on resume). More than anything, this is simply an unfair reality for coaches themselves (or in the case of NCAA overperformers like John Groce, something that might enhance their wallets even if it doesn't end well).
But let's take a look at simply Brad Underwood at Illinois since 2020 (the first year he had a decent team) for the total randomness of tournament performance.
Underwood in the NCAAs at Illinois (2020-24)
-Underwood is 2-3 in the NCAAs at Illinois over this span, which isn't particularly good. Two wins against bozos, and three losses against wildly underseeded opposition. Loyola was 10th in Pomeroy, and received an 8 seed. Houston was a still amazing 2nd overall in Pomeroy (#2 in the country for God's sake), and received a 5 seed (still unbelievable this happened even if Illinois was struggling going on and might have lost to a worse team). Arkansas was 22nd in Pomeroy, and received an 8 seed. There was no tournament played in 2020 and 2024 is pending. Interestingly, all three of Illinois' NCAA opponents defeated a #1 seed, and only one of those #1 seeds was Illinois (that's pretty remarkable btw).
Underwood in the BTT at Illinois (2020-24)
-In sharp contrast, Underwood is 6-2 in the BTT over this span, with 2 championships. Again, there was no 2020 event. In the other two, Underwood has two 3-0 marks, and two 0-1 records. Fascinatingly, in those 8 games, Illinois has played 7 NCAA teams, so in many ways the event has been a mini-NCAAs for Illinois. (And the one non-NCAA team Illinois played is tOSU this year, which is certainly playing at a NCAA level currently). Basically, the BTT overperformance has been very much the opposite of the NCAA underperformance.
Collectively
Underwood is 8-5 in these two events combined, with the 2024 NCAAs pending. This is a good performance, but nothing epic. Me personally, I don't think Underwood's ability to coach changes radically from BTT week to NCAA weeks. Put simply, these are small sample size events where draw is critical and both your own and your opponent's performance is somewhat random based on the teams' ability.
Bottom line, let's hope the roll of the dice that is this season's NCAA draw turns in our favor.
illinois.rivals.com
