Illinois-Chicago Diary (End of Season 1)

NCT Tournament

No. 1 East: Temple
No. 1 Midwest: Illinois
No. 1 South: Tennessee
No. 1 West: Florida

(5) Missouri beat (12) Butler 86-68 in the West Region. Form held through the first two rounds except for 13th-seeded VMI knocking off Georgetown in the first round in the Midwest. Kentucky killified Pepperdine, 102-35, in a second-round game. Then things got weird. Maryland beat the holy hell out of Temple in the East semifinals, while Arizona upset Florida in the West final. They went to the Final Four with top seeds Illinois and Tennessee.

Seton Hall beat Iowa 79-78 to win the ACT.

NCT Final Four:
Tennessee 82, Maryland 79
Illinois 70, Arizona 59

NCT Championship:
Tennessee 80, Illinois 59 (Tournament MVP: Tennessee SG Matt Jamison)

Offseason

First, we say goodbye to three invaluable seniors:
SF Danny Jones (11.3 ppg, 5 rpg) — will not graduate (1.86 GPA); the epitome of senior leadership
C Damon Williams (8.5 ppg, 5.9 rpg) — very dependable; classic “did the little things” guy
G/F Mark Correa (8.8 ppg, 3.6 apg) — will not graduate (1.82 GPA); did yeoman’s work at three positions because of all the injuries

Competition for Jones’s small forward spot is wide open. Fields and JUCO transfer Jared Street look like the favorites, but Wagner did some good things when pressed into service in midseason, and recruit Sean Keyes could sneak in as well. Larry Greer, Williams’s backup last year, will likely take over at center. The staff’s biggest priority this offseason is getting guys straightened out academically. The two major injuries we had (Miller and Scott) were freak injuries and couldn’t be helped. Losing two players for key stretches because of grades is something that CAN be helped.

Gabriel Ichaki was drafted in the second round by San Antonio with the 55th overall pick. He is compared to Malik Rose. In the “Hey! I Remember You!” category, Georgia point guard Donny Keady went 28th to the Lakers.

Mills got job offers from Detroit, Miami of Ohio, Kent State, Central Michigan, Toledo, Wichita State, Eastern Illinois, Ball State, SW Missouri State, and Northern Iowa. He rejected them all. “I’m here for at least five years,” he says. “A lot of them were offering me a ‘fresh start.’ I just got HERE.”

When offseason training came around, we wanted to do some specific things. We increased Greer’s conditioning so he’d be able to handle the extra minutes from moving into a starting role. We greatly increased Fields’s conditioning because we don’t know if he’s going to win the starting SF job or not. We wanted to make White smarter and hopefully not get into foul trouble so much, as well as drop a little weight. Muhammad’s inside game needs work (as he will likely have to start at either PF or C the year after this), though he has a fine outside shot (44.4% on 3’s last year) for a 6’10” Muslim.

Mills retained all of his assistant coaches, mostly because there wasn’t anybody better out there.