Illinois coach Brad Underwood did not want to linger on Thursday night’s historic Big Ten Conference victory at No. 9 Oregon.
The No. 22 Fighting Illini’s 109-77 decision in Eugene, Ore., was not only the largest margin of victory ever by a road team over a Top 10 opponent, but also the second-most points scored in that situation.
“As soon as I say something, then we’ll have a stinker,” cautioned Underwood, whose team concludes its West Coast trip Sunday against Washington in Seattle. “You have a few of those (outliers) every year. To do it against the No. 9-ranked team in the country was a positive. Don’t take too much out of it, the margin. We just made some shots. …
“It’s going to be a long night preparing for Washington. We didn’t come (out West) to win one, we came here to win two.”
Tre White led a balanced attack with 20 points and 11 rebounds for Illinois (10-3, 2-1 Big Ten), which has won three consecutive games.
The Illini shot 57.5 percent from the field (42 of 73), including 16 of 29 from beyond the 3-point arc, and had six players reach double-digits in scoring.
Ben Humrichous had 18 points and Kylan Boswell added 15 as each made four 3-pointers. Leading scorer Kasparas Jakucionis added 16 points, six rebounds and six assists despite battling foul trouble, while Jake Davis scored 12 and Dra Gibbs-Lawhorn added 11.
After leading 45-38 at the intermission, the Illini opened the second half with a 20-4 run to pull away.
“You don’t hang 109 on a Dana Altman team very often,” Underwood said, referring to the Ducks coach. “And you don’t go on the road and beat Oregon unless you work.”
The Huskies (10-4, 1-2) also pulled off a surprise Thursday, defeating visiting Maryland 75-69 as Great Osobor had 20 points on 8-of-12 shooting, 14 rebounds and four assists.
Freshman Zoom Diallo came off the bench to score a career-high 18 points with six assists.
“I told the team, we have nothing to lose,” Diallo said. “They’re coming to our home. This is where we play. We got to the point where all of our bullets came out. … It just shows how good we can be.”
First-year coach Danny Sprinkle tried to keep things simple for his Huskies.
“You’re not going to trick any of these coaches,” he said. “You’re not going to trick the players. You’re not going to come up with a new play out of a time out, like things like that.
“You have to screen. You have to cut hard. You have to play with physicality. You got to finish at the rim with physicality. It’s the basic basketball stuff that wins in this league, and you have to do it an extremely high level.”
The Huskies limited Maryland freshman sensation Derik Queen, who battled foul trouble, to a career-low four points on 1-for-7 shooting.
“We’re finally figuring out, just do your job,” Sprinkle said. “Nobody has to hit home runs. Just do your job. If your job is to screen, be a great screener. Be a great passer and get a teammate a shot. If your job is guard and box out and chest up without fouling, just do that.
“If we get everybody doing that, that’s when stuff like (Thursday) happens. I really felt like nobody got out of their role tonight.”
–Field Level Media
