Some things I wanted to say after Illinois's 4 games with a crappy clickbait thread title:
- Mark Alstork is not Illinois's biggest upperclass addition, Aaron Jordan is. Jordan obviously isn't an "addition" but statistically speaking, I am going to consider him as such. Jordan has an ORtg of 139.9 on an 18.3% usage rate through 4 games. What he is doing is not a fluke. His efficiency is not being held up by some ridiculous shooting percentage somewhere that will eventually regress to the mean. He is simply doing what any NBA role player gets paid millions to do: convert open looks. Words cannot describe how amazing Jordan's emergence is for Illinois's chances at a tournament birth. Right now, Aaron Jordan is everything DJ Richardson struggled with being: a high-efficiency role-player with 3-pt range who spreads the defense, defends, and rebounds.
It's not just Jordan's shooting, either. His defensive rebounding rate is currently the best on the entire Illinois squad. He's playing great defense and has played within the system offensively. If Mark Alstork never shows up this year, Illinois won't miss a beat with Aaron Jordan performing this way.
As for Alstork, he looks to have a crafty dribble but isn't explosive with his first step and doesn't have great leaping ability. He reminds me of Brandon Paul in his first few years when his shots around the basket were made far more difficult than they needed to be.
I expect Alstork to have a few big games here and there when the shots fall or he has a favorable matchup, but I don't expect him to be a consistent top performer. And I'm shocked to be saying this, but that's entirely okay.
- Illinois's three point shooting "drought" is worrisome, but entirely understandable. Illinois has three players shooting above 33% from three-point land: Aaron Jordan, Kipper Nichols, and now Michael Finke (Finke was 1-8 before the Marshall game; he is 4-12 now). This lends credence to the theory that much of the team's three-point struggles are youth- and system-related.
Frazier, Smith, and Williams are a combined 6 of 32 (18.8%) from three-point land. Jordan, Nichols, and Finke are a combined 14 of 34 (41.2%). Hopefully the young guys will figure it out soon. It is not uncommon for first-year guys to struggle with their shot early in the year. The sample size is still small. Illinois's offensive performances have been impressive given the below-average shooting.
- Mark Smith is who we thought he was: a future pro. Smith's current stat sheet wouldn't necessarily jump out of the page, but it is highly promising for two reasons: First, Smith is a freshman with currently a 110.8 ORtg on a 24.3% usage rate. For reference, Melo Trimble finished his freshman season with a 116.5 ORtg on a 24.8% usage rate for Maryland, and Gary Harris finished his first year with a 114.7 ORtg on a 20.6% usage rate for Michigan State. The interesting thing is that Smith is currently shooting 2 of 13 (15.4%) from 3-pt range; Trimble and Harris both finished their freshman campaigns shooting 41.1% from 3-pt range. Smith has been known to be a good shooter; if we account for an uptick in his 3-pt shooting as it regresses to the mean and we allow for tougher 2-pt defense in conference play (I think it is unrealistic to expect him to finish this well around the rim against Big Ten defenses), he should finish right around the level of offensive production and efficiency as Trimble and Harris.
We all thought Smith was a top-30 talent, and he has backed that up through 4 games comparable to other notable top-30 guys from recent memory that he has been frequently compared to.
- Da'Monte Williams and Trent Frazier look like they are both better than their respective rankings. This is a more subjective point, but Williams was unranked by many services following his injury (247 composite #174) and Frazier was ranked #108 by 247's composite formula (#95 by rivals.com). It is clear by simply watching these two guys play basketball for a few minutes that they are going to be highly productive 4-year players.
The easiest comparison to make for the Smith/Williams/Frazier trio is to Illinois's 2009 trio of Richardson/Paul/Bertrand. DJ Richardson was ranked #38 by rivals.com in the class of 2009. Brandon Paul was #42, and Bertrand was #128. Richardson and Paul were effective four-year players, but both had glaring weaknesses- Richardson's ball handling issues were well-documented (and Paul had handle/turnover issues his first few years) and we don't see that with Frazier and Williams. Both of those guys are comfortable handling the ball. Brandon Paul developed into a good player his senior year, but he was never particularly efficient and his teams never won a ton of games; these weaknesses are more or less proven by how long it took someone of his stature in the Big Ten (as a senior) to finally make an NBA roster.
I think this also gives more evidence to two ideas: (1) Rankings beyond the top-30 or top-40 are a total crapshoot and (2) classes vary greatly in strength of basketball talent; the 2009 class was extremely weak. The #38 and #42 players in the 2009 class could easily have been the #80 or #100 ranked players in the 2017 (or some other) class for all we know.
What we do know is that this trio of 2017 guards is the real deal and will win a bunch of games here.
- Illinois looks more like an NCAA Tournament team than many of their Big Ten competitors ranked higher than them by preseason prognosticators. Purdue, Michigan State and Minnesota have lived up to their billing at the top of the conference, but Michigan, Maryland, PSU, Northwestern and Indiana have each shown vulnerability.
Michigan has not lost but has not looked impressive whatsoever against multiple 250+ ranked (awful) teams.
Maryland was down 15 at the half to Bucknell before being the benefactor of some favorable officiating.
Penn St struggled to put away Columbia and Montana in their previous two outings.
Northwestern just lost by 30+ to a good Texas Tech team in a neutral site game and has looked pedestrian in all five of their games this season.
Indiana has looked predictably terrible in all four games they have played this season. They're in for an awful year. What an epic meltdown their fanbase will have if they lose Romeo to KU or Vandy. Underwood and Illinois look to be doing better than Archie Miller and their Hoosier rivals as of right now.
Illinois can finish ahead of Nebraska, Rutgers, IU without question. Can they finish ahead of 3-4 more teams to contend for a tournament birth? Ohio St, Iowa, Michigan, Penn St and Northwestern look like the most vulnerable targets. From what I've seen, this team has a real chance at the tournament.
It all starts with Wake Forest now, as the VIBEZZZ have turned out to be at the wrong frequency in Winston-Salem. Their front court is an absolute embarrassment, and their guards are playing very one-dimensional. Black, Finke and Nichols should score 50 points in that game. Illinois has the quickness on the perimeter to keep their guards in check. Cannot lose that game now.
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