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CHICAGO — Throughout this season, Illinois has been renowned for its offensive prowess, but during March Madness, it was their defense that truly shined.
Arizona and Michigan have consistently dominated the college basketball scene with their outstanding performances on both ends of the court. They have taken their offensive game to an even higher level during the NCAA Tournament.
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This formidable trio is now joined by UConn in the Final Four, set to take place this week in Indianapolis. The first semifinal on Saturday will feature a showdown between the Huskies and the Illini, followed by a clash between the Wolverines and the Wildcats.
All four teams are ranked within the top 10 in the comprehensive college basketball rankings compiled by KenPom, Evan Miyakawa, and Bart Torvik as they head into the Final Four. Notably, the Wolverines and Wildcats occupy the top two spots across all three rankings, boasting some of the most impressive net-efficiency scores ever recorded by KenPom.
Illini’s defense
Illinois, with a 28-8 record, entered the NCAA Tournament ranked second in KenPom’s adjusted offensive efficiency, scoring an average of 131.2 points per 100 possessions. While they were just 28th in defensive rankings at 99.1, the South Region champions have stepped up defensively in the tournament, allowing only .976 points per possession, the best among the remaining teams.
“We’ve been very good throughout the season at times,” coach Brad Underwood said before the regional final win against Iowa. “We just haven’t been that consistent.”
Illinois allowed Penn, VCU, Houston and Iowa to score on just 41.2% of their possessions. The Illini also dominated the glass (plus-16.3 per game) to grab the rebounds that completed those defensive stops.
They’ve done it all with the nation’s tallest roster, with seven players from Saturday’s eight-man rotation standing 6-foot-6 or taller. That has included an influx of European talent, including Croatian twins Tomislav (7-1) and Zvonimir Ivisic (7-2), as well as 6-9 forward David Mirkovic from Montenegro. The outlier among that big lineup, 6-2 senior guard Kylan Boswell, is a strong backcourt defender.
UConn (33-5), meanwhile, has scored on 52.2% of its possessions going back to the second-round win against UCLA, with a high of 54% in Sunday’s comeback from 19 down to shock top overall tournament seed Duke.
Terrence Oglesby, an analyst with ESPN and Field of 68, pointed to the Illini’s ability to play in the gaps to disrupt offenses trying to move the ball and space the floor to create mismatches or lanes.
“Positionally, they’re just elite on top of being massive,” said Oglesby, a former Clemson player. “You go to the Balkans to grab all these guys, and they’re huge and they’ve also been well coached coming all the way up. … The good part about being pretty gap-heavy is the fact that if you’re huge, you can still get out to shooters.”
Illini fans gear up for Final Four
David Scott works with the University of Illinois alumni publication. He says interest among alumni is at a nearly all-time high with the basketball team’s season.
“It’s all anyone can talk about!” Scott said.
And when the Illini beat Iowa on Saturday night to punch their ticket to the Final Four in Indianapolis, fans everywhere started making plans for watching the game against UConn.
Billy Kerstein’s son was on the wrestling team at the University of Illinois, but he is a huge basketball fan as well. And his dad is making sure they can go to the games in person this weekend.
“Throw it out the window, enjoy yourself, and have fun,” Kerstein said.
Final Four tickets are in great demand, which is good news for ticket broker Steve Buzil.
“There’s a lot of interest coming from my customers,” Buzil said.
But there is more interest this time around. His father graduated from the University of Illinois, and his daughter just got her degree from there in May.
“The family is going in honor of my dad. It means a lot to me as well. It’s really good,” Buzil said.
Offensive flow
Michigan (35-3) has the most efficient offense of the Final Four teams, averaging 1.361 points per possession in tournament wins over Howard, Saint Louis, Alabama and Tennessee to edge Arizona’s similar average (1.341).
The Midwest Region champion became the first team to score 90 points in every game through to the Elite Eight since UConn did it in 1995 before falling 102-96 to eventual champion UCLA. Dusty May’s Wolverines are shooting 55.9% through four games, including 44.6% (45 of 101) from 3-point range, and have scored on 60.4% of their tournament possessions.
Before the Sweet 16 win against Alabama, guard Roddy Gayle Jr. said May’s system allows the Wolverines to play “super free.”
“He does a lot of free-flow offense,” star Yaxel Lendeborg said. “He has certain sets, but the sets aren’t necessarily for shots. It’s just for movement, just to get the defense out of their shell, and then attack off those mistakes.”
Net efficiency
The Wolverines’ semifinal against fellow 1-seed Arizona (36-2) will pair teams with all-time great KenPom efficiency metrics.
KenPom bases efficiency on points scored or allowed over a standardized 100-possession pace to eliminate tempo as a factor. Overall rankings are determined by net efficiency in terms of how much a team’s offensive data outpaces its defensive numbers.
Michigan currently leads the country at plus-39.02 after the regionals, followed by Arizona at plus-38.76. By comparison, only two teams have finished a season with higher KenPom numbers going back to the 1996-97 season: Duke in 1998-99 (plus-43.01) and Duke last year (plus-39.29).
“These are these massive teams that also have enough shooting. but they’ve leaned into the everything else,” Oglesby said. “They’ve leaned into the controllable aspects: rebounding, being big, being physical. … I wouldn’t say that the championship game is Michigan and Arizona, but those two teams have just been a freight train going through.”
Neither of those high-efficiency Duke teams managed to cut down the nets. The first lost to UConn in the title game and the second fell a year ago to Houston in a late collapse in the national semifinals.
What’s ahead
The season’s final three games will pair strength-on-strength in the halfcourt.
The four teams have played man defense on 97.3% of their combined halfcourt possessions, according to Synergy. Arizona, Michigan and UConn all rated as “excellent” in the 91st percentile or better, while Illinois is rated “very good” in the 81st percentile.
Yet Synergy rates all of those teams as “excellent” in running halfcourt offense against man defense, with Illinois (97th percentile) and Michigan (96th) as the best.
The key for Saturday could be which teams can get out in transition to avoid tussling with set halfcourt defenses. That could favor Illinois (97th percentile) and Arizona (94th) as the top teams in transition offense with “excellent” ratings from Synergy.
ABC7 Chicago’s John Garcia contributed to this report.
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