Illinois Basketball: Grades from the Illini win over St. Francis
Welcome everyone, to the 2021-22 Illinois basketball season. The Illini welcomed St. Francis (IL) to the State Farm Center for an exhibition contest Saturday night.
The No. 11 team in the country took care of business, as they should, in a 101-34 win over their NAIA opponent. Now let’s jump into some Illini grades for the offense and defense in the win.
Illinois basketball grades in the win over St. Francis.
Offense Grade: A
For the first game of 2021, Brad Underwood came out with a starting five that we all kind of saw coming. Andre Curbelo and Trent Fraizer started as the guards, with Damonte Williams and Jacob Grandison as the wings, and of course, big man Kofi Cockburn started at center.
The offense was obviously very good. The Illini were able to dominate St. Francis physically in the paint outscoring them 56-6 in the restricted area. That would be expected considering St. Francis’ tallest player is 6-foot-8. Kofi was able to dominate on his way to a 6-of-8 shooting night with 14 points and adding six rebounds.
The other star was Andre Curbelo and, at times, boy did he show it with some amazing ball-handling and passing.
Curbelo finished with 11 points and five assists but unfortunately turned the ball over five times. He is going to need to cut the turnovers down as the season goes on. Austin Hutcherson added 14 points off the bench, and Coleman Hawkins added 12 points with both of them going 2-of-3 from three-point range.
Defensive Grade: A
The Illini absolutely dominated the game defensively from start to finish. Fifth-year senior guard Trent Fraizer looked like he was going for Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year totaling six steals on the night.
Curbelo and Cockburn didn’t just contribute on the offensive end. They were also dominant on the defensive end with three blocks between them both.
The defense held St. Francis to 24% shooting from the field and forced 26 turnovers, which led to 39 fast breakpoints for the Illini, who are an elite transition team. They also outrebounded St. Francis 50-24.
Overall View
The Illini did what they were supposed to do, but the biggest thing that stood out to me was how deep this team is going to be this year.
Hutcherson is the ultimate X-factor for this team. If he can add some scoring pop off the bench with the likes of Hawkins and Alfonso Plummer, that could be deadly. Illinois would have one of the best benches in all of the Big Ten.
Next. 4 observations from the Illini win over Penn State. dark
It was a great start for the Illini as they look to build towards the regular season. Illinois plays its second and final exhibition at 7 p.m. Friday against Indiana (Pa.) at the State Farm Center.