lillurk

I agree, it was much better. He’s still out to lunch while his man takes a stroll too often — I don’t recall a junior with a top 100 pedigree and as much game experience as him seeming so lost on that end. But it was progress, and if he plays like that he’s a net positive.

This feels like a game where Bates, Galloway, and Gunn may have a larger-than-usual impact on the outcome because of Illinois’s personnel. Can Bates play within himself on offense and stick to the scouting report on defense? Do Galloway and Gunn offer enough offensively that you give them a little more run to mark the big, athletic Illinois wings?

Yes, I can imagine that X, in particular, would have serious motivation to be back for that one

In this theoretical arrangement is your PG depth chart Cupps/Mustaf, a la this year’s X/JHS? Where you start both but they stagger minutes? Part of the question here is that I’m not sure what Newton is at the college level. Like him, but not sure the role on offense.

He’d be the expected starter at this point, right? Especially given Williams’s recovery timeline?

I agree with this. I have a few stray thoughts in this vein so here goes: 1. Under Archie Miller, IU could never really raise its station or reverse negative momentum due to some balance of his shortcomings and misfortune. Mike Woodson is not Miller. A lot of our worry is a Miller hangover 2. This may be one way CMW’s NBA experience is helpful. In an 82 game season, every team deals with injuries, DNP (rest), slumps. You need to be willing to ride with the healthy players, identify and address issues within the season, self-scout, motivate out of a lull… 3. After the game I found myself giddy at the idea of X and JHS playing together again after Jalen has the responsibility of playing without X. If and when everyone comes back full-strength, the same benefits may pay off in some measure for Geronimo, Tamar, Trey, Malik, and CJ, too.

I think if you adjust your expectations to “not gonna win the B1G because of some dumb early losses (two of which were by 3 combined points) and injuries, but could get everyone back and make the postseason interesting,” it helps.

Without playing a contender! 0-3 against three bubble teams. Not sure that Texas win will be as shiny in a month or two, either

Obviously the closing margins were disappointing, but IU was within striking distance deep in the second half in both the Rutgers and Arizona games — Kansas was the only truly non-competitive one. (Which makes sense, as the one elite team they played on the road thus far.) If, indeed, they learned, then hopefully the non-conference road/neutral games pay dividends in the B1G.

Love this pic and love that you bring it back for special occasions

Woody owns (or owned) a bunch of Btown properties, right?

Feel mildly vindicated! Always felt he could play at a high major.

Am I misremembering or was he a somewhat highly regarded HS underclassman?

It can stick. So much of the defensive problems were positioning, over-helping, moment-to-moment attentiveness. He should start without X (won’t be too mad either way), which moves Galloway to his best role as bench buzzsaw. If you want a big-picture reason for optimism: IU has shown extended stretches of success in a variety of ways. Due to injury, energy/effort (which can be improved upon!), and general early season acclimation, it often hasn’t all happened at once. Get healthy, and let’s see what they can do.

There are going to be games this year where they’ll need these lineups with Kopp at the four, so it’s nice it clicked tonight. (Geronimo hasn’t had it dialed from 3 this year but he offers a sort of middle way if he’s on.)

If TJD sits again I’ll be curious to see how Race performs. I think their minutes should be staggered more, perhaps, as Race has been best this year in extended minutes w/o TJD.

Lol. Yeah, lots of other programs have had bad losses lately; it happens.

Yeah, I think I underrated PU but think they can fall back somewhat as their guard play ebbs. Currently feel pretty good about my take that Illinois was a little overrated — clearly talented but things are going the wrong way. Think it’s fair to have concerns about IU’s losses but also believe the combo of talent is there to have a memorable season.

Kansas wore new unis for the IU game. Appears they’re wearing more new ones tonight. I don’t necessarily want IU to wear six different sets per year but I will say, the Kansas threads do a nice job of being true to their look. If adidas/IU could swing that — and they’ve had a couple more recent alternates I liked — I’d like to see some occasionally

I’m enjoying this, given my enthusiasm for coach Gates and distaste for the Illini

Don’t forget how that team started, though, and the mediocrity of the year prior. We think of those guys as leaders because they were much worse than this team in the non-conf, then awesome from January on. If they don’t turn it around, there’s some really different legacies in that group.

Okay, here are some resources: 1. Average return timeline: 9.8 weeks https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26781131/ 2. Most hoopers recover to previously established performance level https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4922517/#!po=1.66667 3. Expect 9 weeks, less than that (avg of 6.8 weeks) were likely to reinjure https://scholar.google.com/scholar_lookup?journal=Am+J+Sports+Med&title=Intrameduallary+screw+fixation+of+Jones+fractures&author=CM+Larson&author=LC+Almekinders&author=TN+Taft&author=WE+Garrett&volume=30&publication_year=2002&pages=55-60&pmid=11798997&#d=gs_qabs&t=1671655663967&u=%23p%3DUMpsdPw6tKIJ 4. Early surgical treatment (like X’s case) = shorter time to heal and return to competition than boot treatment. This has 8 weeks as the average surgical return https://scholar.google.com/scholar_lookup?journal=Am+J+Sports+Med&title=Early+screw+fixation+versus+casting+in+the+treatment+of+acute+Jones+fractures&author=TS+Mologne&author=JM+Lundeen&author=MF+Clapper&author=TJ+O’Brien&volume=33&publication_year=2005&pages=970-975&pmid=15888715&#d=gs_qabs&t=1671655681294&u=%23p%3DoqUkA90vwU4J

Right, the specifics of the injury and surgery matter. If he has one of the lesser foot injuries that require surgery, we might have him back sooner

Yeah short of a catastrophe the worst case scenario is working him back the week before the BTT, based on a couple peer-reviewed abstracts. The “worst cases” in the studies were much older athletes (30 and 38 in one of them).

Anyone have more specifics on what kind of injury/surgery? Quick googling looks like basketball players returning from foot surgery can expect anywhere from ~3 to 10 weeks’ recovery to return. I know we have some medical experts on the board….