ESPN Men's Basketball

Former Illinois forward Jereme Richmond's unfortunate summer just got much, much worse.

Richmond was charged with aggravated battery and aggravated unlawful use of a weapon for allegedly beating a 17-year-old woman and threatening her with a gun, according a report Tuesday afternoon by the Daily Herald, a suburban Chicago newspaper. Richmond and 22-year-old friend Matthew Riley were arrested outside the victim's house in North Chicago, Ill., on Monday afternoon after police found a .40-caliber semiautomatic pistol in the car that Richmond and Riley had taken to the victim's house.

According to Lake County Assistant State's Attorney Stephen Scheller, the victim and Richmond had a "dating relationship that had soured in recent weeks." And prepare yourself, because it gets scary here:

On Sunday, Scheller said, the woman drove to Richmond’s residence in the 2000 block of Arthur Drive in Waukegan to retrieve her cellphone. The two began to argue outside Richmond’s house, Scheller said, and Richmond shoved the woman back into her car during the ruckus.

Monday afternoon, Scheller said, Richmond and Meyer drove to the woman’s house and Richmond began to argue with her again as her mother looked on. At one point, Scheller said, Richmond spit on the woman and said he was going to shoot her. Richmond turned back toward the car where Meyer was seated and was searching for something when a Waukegan police car came on to the scene.

The implication there is that Richmond had gone back to the car to search for the gun. Whether or not that's true -- terrifying though it may be -- is beside the point. At the end of the day, Richmond could now face up to 14 years in prison if he is convicted on both charges (though he would also be eligible for probation, according to the Herald).

Just a few months ago, Richmond was among the first freshmen in the country to declare for the NBA. Long seen by scouts as a lottery-level talent, Richmond's decision was decried as too hasty by most (including yours truly), and the concerns over his attitude and work ethic -- not to mention some supposed missed workouts -- caused his stock to plummet dramatically.

Richmond went undrafted. The NBA began its lockout. The last we'd heard from him, his uncle was airing potshots about coaches and NBA scouts while his father was attempting to smooth things over in the Chicago Tribune a few days later.

Now all of that -- Richmond's decision, the NBA and the arguments therein -- seems laughably minor. If NBA GMs were hesitant before, they're going to treat Richmond like exposed uranium now. Besides, this sort of thing is much more serious. It cuts much deeper.

Somewhere along the line, things went horribly wrong for Jereme Richmond. It may be a while before he can pick up the pieces.

Illinois began last season with high expectations, a national ranking, and a 10-1 start that seemed to signal that it might have been its year in the Big 10. Things didn't work out that way, as the Illini played unevenly in conference games and endured frustrations with senior Demetri McCamey along with the eventual departure of McDonald's All-American Jereme Richmond.

This preseason, the team is trying to wash away what happened last season and starting off by openly discussing what happened. Center Meyers Leonard, coming off his freshman season and a summer spent with the USA Under-19 team in Latvia, even pointed the finger at himself, according to ESPN Chicago.

Leonard's first season didn't go as he hoped on the court, and he admitted he often allowed his anger to boil over.

"I got frustrated last year some with myself, some with the coaches," Leonard said on Tuesday. "I would talk back. I was pretty immature to be honest."

From Gatehouse News Service:

"It trickles down a lot," junior guard D.J. Richardson said Tuesday. "It messes up the team. We had problems last year. We were still able to win games. We were inconsistent.

"You couldn't really sense it until you go back and look at it at the end of the season. We were trying to win games. At the end of the season, that’s when you noticed how many problems you really had."

Consider those comments good news for Illinois coach Bruce Weber since the first step to correcting a problem is recognizing there was one in the first place and not shying away from it.

Illinois has plenty of talent returning in Leonard, Richardson and guard Brandon Paul. The 7-foot Leonard compiled a 63 percent shooting percentage in nine games in Latvia and was under the watchful eye of Weber during the team's training camp in Colorado Springs as the coach was on the USA selection committee.

Now it'll be up to Weber to rebuild a team with more of a winning attitude. He'll get a head start on it as the Illini head to Italy in August for a preseason tour and some much-needed bonding time.

Thus far, the signs have been positive.

"I think this whole group is coachable," Weber told ESPN Chicago. "I think the other guys ... it was misconstrued they weren't coachable. I think they had limitations. They could only do so much with strength and physicality.

"I think maybe that extra discipline, that extra toughness, that extra work ethic, maybe they learn from the others. I tell them all the time to learn from past experiences, from others' experiences, their failures, so you can have success."

On Thursday night, as the NBA draft picks wound their way into the late reachers of the second round, Illinois forward Jereme Richmond -- once seen as a potential lottery-worthy talent -- never heard his name announced. Richmond's stock was no doubt hurt by NBA scouts' impressions of him as immature. His decision to leave Illinois after his freshman year was questioned by many as a premature one. His travails at Illinois, many of which are still unknown to the public, included alleged academics issues and poor relationships with coaches and teammates. Rumors of missed NBA workouts torpedoed what was left of his draft stock.

Now Richmond enters the strange limbo that is life as an undrafted free agent. He could land with an NBA team. He could find himself taking his talents to Europe. Either way, his NBA career -- which once seemed like a sure thing -- is now in serious doubt.

Needless to say, this turn of events did not sit well with Richmond's uncle, Crawford Richmond, who delivered some strong words on the topic to the Chicago Tribune's Chris Hine.

"NBA executives have to be a fool not to consider him," said Richmond's uncle, Crawford Richmond. "They have to be fools and they are fools, but what they're going to do is they're going to get him for cheap. He's going to play in the NBA."

Maybe so. But here's where things get a little bit crazy:

"He's way better than (No. 1 overall selection) Kyrie Irving," Crawford Richmond said. "He's right there with (North Carolina's) Harrison Barnes. I can't tell the difference. Jereme is soft spoken and he's different, but that doesn't make him a bad person."

"I'm tired of people talking about his character. I know he's a high character person," Richmond said. "Who's the judge and who's the jury?"

As good as Harrison Barnes? Better than Kyrie Irving? Come on ... really?

Crawford Richmond also cited the selection of former Washington State shooting guard Klay Thompson -- who was arrested in March on charges of marijuana possession -- in the first round as a bit of hypocrisy on the part of NBA general managers. Again, this is strong stuff:

"Jereme never has done a police crime. Never. I want you to quote that in your article," Richmond said. "What about (Thompson)? He got busted by the police, marijuana possession. And he goes first round?"

Richmond may have a point there; the NBA isn't always so consistent on the matter of character and intangibles. But in 2011, a marijuana possession charge isn't (and probably shouldn't be) enough to scare the NBA away. Thompson did enough in interviews and workouts to put concerns over the arrest to bed. By all accounts, Richmond's workouts weren't nearly as convincing.

The Illinois forward may still get his NBA career on track. Often, going undrafted can be a blessing a disguise. But if we're wondering where Richmond gets his outsized confidence despite his so-so production on the court, his uncle's comments are a pretty good place to start. Somewhere along the line, Richmond got some bad advice. Now he's paying the price. And no appeal from a family member is going to change that.

Update: The show goes on Monday. Bill Richmond, Jereme's father and the brother of Crawford Richmond, had declined to comment to Hine until he saw his brother's comments in the Chicago Tribune Sunday. Those comments prompted Bill Richmond to discuss Jereme's situation with Hine Monday. In so many words, Bill Richmond disagrees with his brother, especially about Illinois assistant coach Jerrance Howard, who Crawford Richmond apparently blames for Jereme's hasty decision to leave the Illini:

"I would never want to talk to Jerrance Howard again in my life," Crawford Richmond said.

His brother disagrees, saying Crawford Richmond does not speak for the family.

"Jereme doesn't feel that way about the process, Illinois or Jerrance Howard," Bill Richmond said. "We love Jerrance. He's like a friend to me, he really is. He's a good guy and he's never done anything but try and help our kid get to where he wanted to go."

Bill also wanted to make sure Kyrie Irving's family, whom the Richmonds count as friends, weren't insulted by Crawford's statement that Jereme was better than Irving, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2011 NBA draft:

[...] "What I read (Sunday) morning was shocking," he said. "(Jereme Richmond and Irving) won a gold medal together (playing with USA Basketball) and they're friends. I don't want the Irvings to feel that's how we feel, because we don't," Bill Richmond said.

Bill Richmond confirmed to Hine that Jereme indeed missed workouts during his draft preparation. It appears those missed workouts had more to do with Richmond's plummeting draft stock than any perceived character issues, though you could argue that missed workouts speak to certain character issues (whether apathy or overconfidence or whatever you want to call it).

In any case, things may be a little frosty next time the two brothers talk. Good thing Thanksgiving is still months away, I suppose.

TULSA, Okla. -- This has become the Bill Self Subregional.

The Kansas coach is everywhere or, more accurately, his past is everywhere.

He’s an Oklahoma native and Oklahoma State alum whose first two head-coaching jobs were in this city, at Oral Roberts and Tulsa. Then he went to Illinois, where he succeeded Lon Kruger and preceded Bruce Weber.

Kruger played Weber Friday for the right to face Self Sunday. Weber won, which pits Self and Kansas against Weber and Illinois. And that means the subject of the mock funeral Weber held for Self early in his Illinois tenure -- in an effort to get players and fans alike to quit talking about the departed coach -- came up Saturday.

This also marks the second straight year that Self has faced an underdog that defeated UNLV to get to the Jayhawks. Last year it was Northern Iowa, and you know how that turned out -- also in a game played in Oklahoma.

But despite all the Self connections, that’s only half the matchup here. And the potential exists for two excellent games at the BOK Center Sunday night.

No. 5 seed Arizona (28-7) vs. No. 4 seed Texas (28-7), 6:10 p.m. ET (TNT)

What to watch: Can the Wildcats’ efficient offense produce against the Longhorns’ relentless defense? Arizona shoots 51.6 percent from two-point range and 39.6 percent from 3. Texas allows opponents to shoot only 42 percent and 28.7 percent, respectively. Whoever gets the advantage in that strength-on-strength matchup will probably win the game.

Who to watch: Arizona forward Derrick Williams against Texas’ Tristan Thompson. Williams is the guy who makes Arizona go, an All-American who has cranked his play up even higher -- through four postseason games he is averaging 22 points and 8.5 rebounds. Williams also had the spectacular blocked shot that clinched the game against Memphis on Friday -- but Thompson is the guy who swats shots in bunches. The freshman rejected a career-high seven of them against Oakland, and he’s likely to get the first defensive call against Williams.

Why to watch: Arizona has been must-see TV its past two games, winning one (Memphis) and losing one (Washington in the Pac-10 tournament final) at the very end. Texas has at times looked like the best team in the nation, including for about 30 minutes against Oakland on Friday. And there will be plenty of future NBA players on the floor, whenever they decide to turn pro.

What they’re saying: “I’m coming back next year. I’ve already signed up for summer classes.” -- Texas’ Thompson, who projects as a lottery pick but delivered that news in the Longhorns locker room Saturday. Now we’ll wait and see whether he really means it.

“He’s not going to like this, but he took a lot of shots. That’s just his game. Any kind of shot is a good shot for him.” -- Williams on former AAU teammate Jordan Hamilton, volume-shooting forward for Texas.

“It’s overwhelming as a coach that’s getting ready to play against Texas to watch him offensive rebound. … He might be the nation’s best offensive rebounder.” -- Arizona coach Sean Miller on Thompson.

Of note: Both schools have demonstrated impressive recruiting reach. Arizona has two players from New York and one from St. Louis in its probable starting lineup, plus a pair of Californians. Texas starts one Texan, Gary Johnson, but otherwise fills out its first five with two Canadians, a Turk and a Californian.

No. 9 seed Illinois (20-13) vs. No. 1 seed Kansas (33-2), 8:40 p.m. ET (TNT)

What to watch: Last year at this stage, the top-seeded Jayhawks felt the pressure and played tightly against underdog Northern Iowa in a shocking loss. Self said he wants this year’s team to relax and enjoy the NCAA experience, but acknowledged that he thought Kansas was again tight for a half against Boston University on Friday. Illinois, meanwhile, should be afforded the chance to play with a relaxed attitude. The seasoned Illini are significant underdogs with nothing to lose, and a victory would redeem what has been a disappointing season. Kansas has the better team, but also the greater pressure.

Who to watch: Illinois point guard Demetri McCamey. Leading his team in both scoring (14.9 points per game) and assists (6.1), he’s vital to the Illini’s chances. Especially his distributing. They’re 15-0 this year when McCamey dishes out seven or more assists. For Kansas, the focal point of Self’s pound-it-in offensive approach is the Morris twins, Marcus and Markieff. They’ll take their muscular physiques and all-court games up against an Illinois front line that has an abundance of length but not the same amount of girth.

Why to watch: After what happened last year to KU in the round of 32, miss this game at your peril. But also because Illinois, if it plays the way it did Friday against UNLV, could have a legitimate chance to win.

What they’re saying: “Last year we were kind of No. 1 the whole season, and everyone had us picked as the favorite. I don’t know if that was more of a burden to us than a good thing. We’re not trying to hold onto anything this year. We don’t have anything to hold onto.” -- Kansas guard Tyrel Reed, on the (slightly) lesser pressure on the Jayhawks this season.

“When he plays and plays well, we’re a top team in the country. We can compete with anybody.” -- Weber on McCamey

“I wouldn’t say he’s one of my best friends, but we have a cordial relationship.” -- Weber on Self.

“I have total respect for him as a coach. … But we’re not close. We don’t talk.” -- Self on Weber.

Of note: One of the things that makes Kansas so hard to cover is the shooting ability of its guards. If defenses distort themselves too much to collapse on the Morris twins inside, they risk leaving Reed, Brady Morningstar and Tyshawn Taylor (among others) open on the perimeter. And lately, that’s been a bad trade-off. In KU's past two games, the Big 12 title game against Texas and the NCAA opener against BU, the Reed-Morningstar-Taylor trio has made 12 of 25 3-point shots. ... Weber had no update on the status of swingman Jereme Richmond, who was suspended for the UNLV game for what the coach termed a violation of "athletic department team rules." Weber said the school will discuss Richmond's status privately Saturday and make an announcement on his status Sunday.

TULSA, Okla. -- Better late than never, the Illinois team we thought we’d see this season showed up.

In force.

It’s been a disappointing slog of a season for the Illini, which began the year in the AP top 15 and ended it sliding close to the 68-team bubble. But with the season on the line Friday night against No. 8 seed UNLV, No. 9 seed Illinois played a spectacular game in a 73-62 victory.

“We’d been inconsistent,” coach Bruce Weber said. “But tonight we were definitely consistent, played at a high level.”

This is how high: Illinois shot 60 percent from the field, 54 percent from 3-point range, and got every shot it wanted thanks to a half-hearted UNLV defense. The final score was laughably deceptive, with a 13-2 closing run by UNLV making it look much closer than reality. Illinois led by 22 at halftime and was never threatened thereafter.

Now we’ll see whether the Illini can put together back-to-back stellar performances.

Illinois hasn’t won two straight games since early January. That doesn’t exactly engender confidence that this team is ready to take down No. 1 seed Kansas on Sunday in the round of 32, but there was plenty of optimism in the Illini locker room Friday night.

“It’s going to be a tough game, but they’re beatable,” said forward Mike Davis, who tore up the Runnin’ Rebels for 22 points and 10 rebounds.

The Illini can harbor optimism for a couple of reasons. One, they’ve played a rigorous schedule -- 18 games against teams in the NCAA tourney field, eight of them against teams with top-four tourney seeds. Two, they’ve come close to having a much better record than their current 20-13 -- they’re 1-8 in games decided by five points or fewer, or in overtime. Finish half of those games correctly, and Illinois is maybe a 5-seed.

But there’s no re-doing what’s already done. Instead, there is simply the chance to make good at the most important time of the year.

“It’s not what you do at the beginning of the year …” said guard Demetri McCamey. “It’s about what you do now. Everybody forgets about what you did at the beginning of the season or the Big Ten season if you go out and win in March.”

It’s been a long time since Illinois won in March. Since 2006, in terms of the NCAA tournament. For a team with four senior starters, getting at least one career Big Dance victory was a major incentive.

“Coming in, we just said we’re going to go as hard as we can,” Davis said. “If we lose and don’t play as hard as we can, I can’t live with that for the rest of my life.”

The one Illinois player who is living with regret right now is freshman swingman Jereme Richmond. One of the team’s top seven players, Richmond did not play Friday night for what Weber termed “a violation of athletic department team rules, nothing more than that.” Weber was non-committal when asked whether Richmond would play Sunday against the Jayhawks.

“It’s something we’ll talk about,” he said.

Friday night, there was finally something good to talk about with this Illinois basketball team. We’ll see how long the Illini can keep the positive vibes flowing.

Bruce Weber is not having his finest season at Illinois. It's not just that the Illini are mediocre. It's that the Illini are mediocre despite having one of the most talented teams in the Big Ten, a team stocked with top-level recruits, three senior starters, a coterie of accurate outside shooters and a point guard who has at various times in his career looked like the best guard -- and arguably the best player -- in the country.

That point guard is Demetri McCamey. As you probably know, McCamey's senior season has not lived up to advance billing, especially during Big Ten play. The guard's overall season averages -- 14.4 points and 6.5 assists per game -- look solid, but they belie McCamey's ugly two-point field goal percentage (41.8 percent; by contrast, McCamey is shooting 47.2 percent from 3) and a recent midseason disappearing act. Since Jan. 11, Illinois has lost six of nine Big Ten games. In that span, McCamey has posted four single-digit scoring performances and a flurry of ugly shooting nights, including the following: 3-of-8, 3-of-13, 4-of-11, 2-of-11, 2-of-11, 2-of-9, 1-of-10. (His assist totals have also plummeted; McCamey hasn't posted most than five assists in any game since Jan. 18.)

That most recent effort -- four points on 1-of-10 from the field in a home loss to Purdue -- came just three days after Illinois had seemed to right its ship with a solid win at Minnesota. That's when Bruce Weber benched McCamey, freshman Jereme Richmond and senior forward Mike Tisdale for the start of the game in one of those last-ditch, "Well, I've got to try something!" coaching moves you see desperate coaches use every now and again. And it seemed to work! McCamey played well, Illinois got the win, and whatever it was that had been bothering this team for weeks seemed to be a thing of the past.

Then Purdue came to town, Illinois lost thanks to a meandering, weakly played second half, and the Illini were suddenly right back to square one.

What's the cause of all this? What mysterious factors have caused a seemingly talented team -- and its seemingly elite point guard -- to be so uneven on the court? Is it chemistry? Coaching? Playing style? Something else? As reported by ESPN Chicago's Scott Powers, in an interview Friday on ESPN 1000 (two days before the Purdue loss), Weber took a crack at his own version of an answer:

"It's disappointing, some of it is Demetri, obviously," Weber said Friday on "The Waddle & Silvy Show" on ESPN 1000. "But the outside influences, just kill kids, I'm just telling you. I feel bad. He was playing so well, and all of a sudden, the runners, the agents, the third-party people, they're all telling him he's an all-American and this and that.

"Then, he stopped coming in to work hard and spend extra time on his shot and all the stuff you need to do. Here, I'm saying give a five-month commitment, put more time in, and they're telling him how great he is. It just screws up kids. It's not just me. If you talk to our the football coaches, you can talk to other coaches in the Big Ten, it's one of the worst things we have to deal with in college basketball is the outside influences, the third parties, the agents, the runners, whatever. It's that honestly.

[...] "He's a kid," Weber said. "If you're a kid, would you rather hear Coach Weber say 'come in and work harder' or 'you're great?'"

Later in the interview, Weber extended that philosophy to his whole team, saying the Illini hadn't been playing hard because "outside influences" started to infect individual players with concerns over playing time, minutes, exposure and the like.

Weber's right: This is not a problem unique to the Illini, nor is it a problem that is easily solved from a coaching perspective. "Outside influences," like that weird ant parasite from "Planet Earth," have a way of insinuating themselves into the fabric of successful teams, and once they're there they're very hard to expel.

Still, as much as you might feel for Weber -- battling all these sexy "outside influences" with the unappetizing alternatives of "commitment" and "hard work" and "more hours in the gym," which is not a fair fight -- at some point, the coach bears the brunt of the blame here. Ultimately, it's the program's job to make sure its players are collectively focused. Ultimately, it's the coach's job to make sure his program is adequately equipped for that effort. There's an old-fashioned term for failing in this regard. It's called "losing your team." Has Weber lost his?

We'll find out the rest of the way. No, it isn't the Big Ten contender we thought it could be; the Illini don't have the interior strength they need to compete with big, athletic frontcourts, and no level of emotional commitment is going to change that. (Illinois also continues to be a victim of poor shot selection; based on its percentages, it would behoove this team to take a few more 3s, which is something we've been saying since the loss to UIC.)

Still, this team is -- or at least should be -- too talented to keep this up. Can Weber wrest control of his squad back from the nefarious outside influences in time for a late-season push? Or is it already too late? If so, how much blame will he face for this season's disappointments? How restless will the natives -- who have vacillated on Weber throughout his up-and-down tenure at Illinois -- become then?

Illinois might not be the most entertaining bunch to watch this season, but you can't fault it for lacking intrigue. This remains a fascinating team. And not always for the right reasons.

Welcome to Saturday. Or, at least for college hoops fans, Saturday as it should be. There's no baseball, college football, NFL playoffs, or any other popular-but-inferior (kidding!) sport to distract the casual fan from the hoopy goodness you and I have been enjoying for two months now. No, it's just college hoops, and what better way to welcome in the sports tourist than with two huge conference games featuring two ranked league contenders apiece?

Yes, I'm talking Villanova-Syracuse and Ohio State-Illinois, both of which deserve the recap treatment. So, without further ado:

No. 7 Villanova 83, No. 3 Syracuse 72: Well, this was a surprise.

It's not so much that Villanova's double-digit win was surprising in and of itself, though it was; at this point, any double-digit win at the Carrier Dome must be greeted with some measure of shock. Syracuse entered the game having lost exactly five home games in the past two and a half seasons, the last coming Feb. 14, 2010, when Louisville legitimately shocked Jim Boeheim's team in Syracuse. The Orangemen haven't lost often in recent seasons, and they certainly haven't suffered many of those losses at home.

But more surprising than the win itself was the way Villanova got it. Jay Wright's team didn't just solve Syracuse's famed 2-3 zone. The Wildcats shredded it. The Cuse entered Saturday's top 10 matchup with the stingiest zone in the Big East, one that was allowing a mere .95 points per possession to conference opponents. Villanova scored 1.58 points per trip on offense Saturday afternoon (per scacchoops.com). That's a crazy number for any game -- Villanova came into Saturday averaging 1.13 points per trip against Big East foes -- let alone one against this rangy, athletic Boeheim zone.

With the exception of some late press-break trouble and a 9-0 Syracuse run in the closing minutes, believe it or not, this Villanova team made Syracuse's elite defense look downright pedestrian. Impressed? Of course. Surprised? That too. A few more assorted thoughts follow:

• Syracuse's zone might have been shredded, but the Orange didn't play poorly on the offensive end. On a tempo-free basis -- Boeheim's team scored 1.39 ppp Saturday -- they were downright excellent. What was the difference? For one, Villanova simply made more shots. The Wildcats shot 50 percent from the field, including an 11-of-24 mark from beyond the arc. Syracuse, by contrast, was 43 percent from the field overall and made only 10 of its 26 tries from 3.
• And, as they so often do, free throws changed the game. Villanova got to the foul line at a much higher rate (48.0 percent to Syracuse's 19.4), which is an advantage in and of itself. But when you make 22 of 24 from the foul line, as Nova did, that advantage is exponential and difficult to overcome. (It should be noted that a chunk of those free throw attempts came late in the game when Syracuse needed to foul, but the Wildcats still made them count, and the free throw disparity existed before the game was in last-ditch-comeback mode.)
• Villanova might have the perfect blueprint for Syracuse's zone. The Wildcats are a balanced team with a host of capable ball handlers and big men who can comfortably operate from the high block. Syracuse loves to extend its zone, trap guards, force long skip passes, and jump in passing lanes. They collapse on interior passes and use their length to challenge post shots. But when you've got guys like Maalik Wayns and Corey Fisher -- who can not only handle those traps but split them, creating odd-man advantages and open shots -- as well as swingmen like Corey Stokes and forwards like Antonio Pena and Mouphtaou Yarou, you can get into the zone, break it down, get layups and open looks, and your life is that much easier.
• Syracuse's poor perimeter shooting continues to be an issue. The Cuse have been winning in spite of their low (32.6 percent) 3-point field goal percentage for much of the season. That's because Syracuse's defense is tough, its transition game is great, and its athleticism is such that it can get interior looks for Rick Jackson and Kris Joseph almost at will. But when an opposing offense is taking your defense apart, you have to be able to keep pace -- especially when you need to put together a late rally -- and if you can't hit shots from long range, it's hard to do that.
• What about the Big East? Where does this game put Villanova (which lost at Connecticut on Monday) and Syracuse (which lost at Pittsburgh) in the context of their conference? I think you might downgrade Syracuse just a notch; if this defense doesn't carry Boeheim's team, the Cuse will struggle to keep pace with Pittsburgh in the conference chase. You might also be inclined to upgrade Villanova (and maybe, by extension, UConn), because away wins against elite Big East teams are very difficult to come by.
• Overall, though, I'm not sure this game moves the needle much. We still have three bona fide contenders for the Big East crown -- Pittsburgh, Villanova and Syracuse -- a potential outside challenge from UConn, and a host of teams (Louisville, Georgetown and the rest) that will win their share of games against the top three before the year is out. Syracuse could use some work on offense, and it did not have the best pair of defensive outings in its past two games, but overall, the conference picture looks pretty constant for now.

---

No. 1 Ohio State 73, No. 22 Illinois 68: If you pegged this game as the first loss of Ohio State's season, you weren't alone. Thousands of orange-clad Illinois fans -- and, as if you care, yours truly -- were right there with you.

It certainly had that feel, didn't it? A tough environment. A ranked conference opponent. An apparently vulnerable No. 1 coming off a couple weeks of unimpressive performances, including a four-point escape at Michigan and three-point home wins against Minnesota and Penn State. All the warning signs of a No. 1 upset -- which would have been only the third in Illinois hoops history, a stat I had trouble believing when CBS put it into my brain -- were there.

Instead, we got another impressive performance from Ohio State, another comprehensive game from freshman Jared Sullinger, and another example of why this Buckeyes team is now your undefeated No. 1 in the first place: They're really, really tough to beat.

• For all of OSU's perimeter weapons, that toughness starts in the post, which means it starts with Sullinger. The freshman put up another classic line Saturday, scoring 27 points and grabbing 16 rebounds in a full 40 minutes on the floor. But perhaps most impressive was Sullinger's free throw shooting. The big man, who is shooting about 73 percent from the line this season, made 13 of his 15 foul attempts Saturday. You probably don't need me to tell you just how lethal that is. Sullinger is so good at getting early position on the block, and so strong once he's there, that you practically have to foul him if you don't want him to get two easy points. But what good is fouling if Sullinger makes his free throws? Big Ten coaches of the world: You are now free to slam your heads repeatedly against your desks. (As if you weren't already.)
• Sullinger isn't the only player that played 40 minutes for Ohio State on Saturday. That honor also went to Jon Diebler and David Lighty, both of whom played every available minute at Illinois. Buckeyes coach Thad Matta appears to have already settled on a seven-man rotation. Forward Dallas Lauderdale is still a starter, but he's averaging 18.7 minutes per game. Instead, Matta goes early and often to freshman Aaron Craft, whose 31 minutes also cut into the playing time of William Buford, arguably OSU's best all-around perimeter scorer, because Craft is the only thing resembling a point guard that the Buckeyes have.
• This rotation also features spot duty -- Saturday, that meant 12 minutes -- for highly touted recruit Deshaun Thomas. Thomas is like a secret weapon: He doesn't get on the court all that often, but he's dangerous when he does. Unlike a lot of bench players, Thomas isn't remotely hesitant to shoot the ball; he has the highest usage rate of any Buckeye when he's on the floor, which basically means "he takes a lot of shots." You saw that in the second half Saturday. With the game tied at 50-50 and 9:34 remaining, Thomas hit the first of two quick 3-pointers -- one of which came on a wide-open fast break -- and then scored on a nice post move over Illinois freshman Jereme Richmond with 5:35 remaining. By the time he left the game, Thomas had scored a quick eight points, Ohio State built a six-point lead, and the Buckeyes would never trail again.
• If you're a particularly positive Illinois fan, you might actually be encouraged by this home loss. Why? Because your opponent -- the ruthlessly efficient No. 1 team in the land -- played relatively well. Your best player, Demetri McCamey, did not. And not only did you lead for much of the second half, you had a chance to win the game in the final seconds. That's not so bad, is it?
• And boy, did McCamey ever play poorly. It's safe to say that Illinois won't win too many games when McCamey goes 2-for-11 from the field, 1-of-5 from 3, and has nearly as many turnovers (four) as assists (five). It was fitting, then, that Illinois' final chance to tie the game came on a poor decision by McCamey, when the guard passed up a long three to enter the ball to Mike Tisdale in traffic. Tisdale lost the handle, and the game was over. McCamey has been brilliant all season long, so this is nothing to worry about. Everyone has bad games. Unfortunately for Bruce Weber's team, McCamey picked this day -- with a winnable upset of the No. 1 team on the table -- to have his ugliest game of the season. (And yes, as a few commenters below have pointed out, much of the credit for McCamey's bad day goes to Aaron Craft, who played a stellar on-ball defensive game.)
• Another encouraging sign for Illinois: After facing transfer rumors last week, freshman forward Richmond continues to play well. Richmond scored 18 points on 9-of-12 shooting from the field and added 10 rebounds, three of which came on the offensive end. Richmond is one of the few players on Illinois who can bang down low and get easy buckets in the paint; unlike Illinois' guards and true forwards, he's not really an inside-out player. If Richmond can add that sort of offensive production to a team that is still a bit too reliant on the long two-point jump shot, he could change the face of Illinois' attack. This loss was not without its silver linings.

Hey, wait a second. Did I just spend 1700 words recapping two games? Yes. I did. The day's first fixtures were just that good.

But here's the best part: This day isn't even close to over yet. I hope your couch groove is ready. Mine certainly is.

Yours truly is going to get fully back into the morning recap game starting Monday morning -- this was a bit of a weird week, as my very confused internal clock can attest -- because there is too much good basketball going on every night to not try to discuss all of it in the morning.

Such was the case last night, especially with regard to Texas' 90-84 overtime win against Illinois. With all due respect to some of the marathon thrillers, this was probably the best nationally televised game of the season so far ... and I am still not quite sure what to make of either of these teams. To the bulleted random thoughts!

• Both of these teams look like very good defensive teams. Both, to the naked eye, were. That said, both allowed a very high number of points per possession; I tweeted that Rick Barnes looked like he had another good defense -- one of the few things Texas did consistently well even during its slide last season -- before checking the tempo-free numbers and realizing that somewhere midway through the second half, Illinois was scoring about 1.25 points per trip. Texas was even more efficient than that. So much for stifling defense. That said, both teams clamped down in the second half -- neither ended the game with the gaudy numbers they had been putting up for much of the first half -- and on both sides of the ball, every shot was challenged, blocked, or resulted in a physical play (and, oftentimes, a foul). Which is why it's probably fair to expect both of these teams to get awfully good at defense. Neither was great for all 40 minutes, but each simply has too much athletic talent at the guard positions and around the rim to be quite as defensively forgiving as in the early going last night.
• If I'm a Texas fan, I'm feeling awfully good about my team right now. Not just because the Longhorns got the win -- it's still early in the season, and last season we all saw how quickly early success can fade -- but because the Longhorns played with such self-assured confidence down the stretch. That's a team that starts a freshman at point guard (Cory Joseph), had a freshman at forward in for the majority of the late minutes (Tristan Thompson) and relies on an occasionally erratic (and often brilliant) sophomore Jordan Hamilton for much of its scoring. Texas' offense was stagnant in the later minutes; there was too much standing around, too many haphazard ball screens, and very little of the flowing stuff that got Texas its points in the first half. And still, Texas' young players -- Hamilton and Joseph especially -- were able to make big one-on-one plays down the stretch against a defense that had severely ratcheted up the intensity. The Longhorns will have to get much more cohesive as the season goes along, less quick to abandon their offense for one-on-one stuff, but the sheer playmaking ability on hand definitely portends good things.
• Illinois needs more Jereme Richmond. Demetri McCamey played like an All-American last night, but he was bottled up by Dogus Balbay late in the game. That's when Richmond started to show some of what he can do -- bringing the ball up the floor, dribbling the length of the court and finishing underneath, getting rebounds and using his intuitive interior scoring ability to get Illinois second-chance points under the basket. It wasn't enough to win, but there were signs that Richmond can fill a role Illinois has desperately needed on this team -- a scoring wing with versatile skills who can create his own shot with the ball in his hand.
• Oh, and there was McCamey. If Demetri keeps playing like he did last night, he's going to have a fantastic season. He won't face too many more lockdown defenders like Balbay, who might be the best perimeter defender in college basketball now that Chris Kramer has left Purdue. When McCamey gets hot, look out. He's still a shooting guard playing point, but for a shooting guard, he's an awfully good passer, too.

It's too early to draw too many conclusions from one game, but if I was a fan of either team, I wouldn't be all that concerned. There is plenty of room for improvement here, but for a Nov. 19 game at a neutral site, this was a pretty encouraging performance for both.

Remember when Bruce Weber couldn't recruit?

For a while there, that implication -- whether true or false -- hung like a weight around Weber's neck. Illinois fans saw their guy could coach, but Weber's best seasons (including the brilliant two-loss run to the national title game in 2005) came with the benefit of predecessor Bill Self's players. Once those players left the program and the talent (and wins) seemed to dwindle, Weber was stuck answering the age-old succession question: Yeah, but can he recruit? More specifically, can he recruit in Chicago?

The first question has been settled by the past two signing days; Weber's 2009 and 2010 classes were both among the 15 or 20 best in the country. And if there was any remaining doubt about the second question, Weber's 2011 class has made it officially moot.

That's because the 2011 class, which Weber officially inked yesterday, features four players ranked among the top 20 at their positions and three in the ESPNU 100 and -- get this -- all of them hail from Chicago. Forward Mike Shaw, small forward Mychael Henry, point guard Tracy Abrams and Nnanna Egwu all played their high school hoops in and around the Chicago area at schools like St. Ignatius, De La Salle Prep, Orr Academy and Mt. Carmel high school. There are other good Chicago-area players heading to other schools in the class -- Kentucky commitment Anthony Davis, the No. 2 player in the class, for one -- but the depth and breadth of Weber's domination in the area is impressive all the same.

This isn't the first time Weber's done well in Chicago, of course. Top 2010 recruit Jereme Richmond hails from Waukegan, Ill. His classmate, Crandall Head, is from the city proper. In 2009, Illinois Mr. Basketball Brandon Paul, a Gurnee, Ill., native -- brought his talents to Champaign, Ill., too. Weber had made serious strides in the city before 2011. But altogether, with the 2011 class in the fold, six of Weber's past 11 recruits come from the Chicago area. Only D.J. Richardson, a Peoria, Ill. native, can be counted as top Weber recruit who isn't from the Second City.

In other words, the question is answered. Yes, Bruce Weber can recruit. Yes, he can recruit -- maybe even own -- Chicago. And yes, after once feeling the pangs of uncertainty about their new coach, Illinois fans can rest easy. The Illini are going to be good for a while.

You can forgive Illinois fans if they spend the early part of the new season tweaking out about defense. After all, defense is Bruce Weber's calling card, the one consistent thing he's been able to instill in every team, good or bad, since he took over at Illinois. Ball pressure to 30 feet, stifling man-to-man rotation, comprehensive interior help -- to win under Weber, this is what the Illini have to do. Usually, it is what they do.

That wasn't the case in 2009-10. For a variety of reasons, Illinois' defense was merely mediocre in last season's campaign. Weber's team allowed .927 adjusted points per possession, which ranked No. 49 in the country. It's a decent mark, but not an impressive one, especially considering the drop-off it represented from the previous season, when the Illini were the fourth-most efficient defense in the country. Even in 2007-08, when Illinois finished 16-19 -- the worst record of Weber's career -- Illinois was a much better defensive team (.899 adjusted points per possession, ranked No. 21) than in 2009-10. Last winter, had Illinois played defense even as well the worst team in Weber's tenure, the Illini probably wouldn't have ended up in the NIT. True story.

All of which is a long preamble to the current question: How does this year's Illinois defense look?

One game is not exactly a fair sample size (especially when that game is a season-opener against the UC-Irvine Anteaters), but even if it was, the jury would still be out. From the Big Ten Geeks:

Bruce Weber must have been pleased with his team's first half against UC-Irvine, in which the Illini allowed just 0.49 points per possession. The Anteaters shot just 23 percent from the field and turned it over on nearly a third of their possessions. [...] After intermission, however, it was a completely different story. Suddenly UC-Irvine was scoring in bunches, using dribble penetration to give the Illini fits. After scoring just 18 points in the first 20 minutes, the Anteaters reeled off 25 points in 10 minutes. Clearly, allowing a Big West team to score at a 100-point pace for an extended period is not something to be proud of, no matter how stifling the first half defense was.

Illinois got things under control after that stretch, and eventually ran away with a win that wasn't even as close as the final score, 79-65, would indicate. And, again, it's just the season opener; Illinois will have plenty of time to work out the kinks. But it is something worth watching. Unless Brandon Paul continues to shoot like he did last night (6-for-8 from beyond the arc, 18 points), and Jereme Richmond is even better than everyone thinks, this Illinois team probably isn't destined for a brilliant offensive season. To compete for the Big Ten title, it will, as always, have to play stifling defense.

The drill, you know it. Here are five things I can't wait to see in the Big Ten this season:

1. How -- and whether -- Purdue recovers

At the risk of overplaying the Robbie Hummel story (he was, after all, the story of Big Ten media day, too), I'm going with this at No. 1. To me, there is no greater intrigue in the league this season than in finding out just what effect Hummel's ACL tear will have on his team in 2010-11. We know from last year's injury that the forward added far more to Purdue's offense than to its defense. Purdue's offensive efficiency drastically declined after Hummel's first ACL tear last February (thanks in large part to a couple of 40-point stinkers in games against Michigan State and Minnesota, the latter of which saw the Boilermakers score 11 points in the first half), but there was some sign Purdue had righted the points-per-possession ship during their run to the Sweet 16. Defensively, the Boilers were not only fine, they were better with Hummel out; coach Matt Painter changed his team's style, focusing less on offensive rebounds demanding his team get behind the ball with all five players. With Chris Kramer still patrolling the perimeter, and a much more careful Boilermakers team on the floor, Purdue ended the season with the third-most efficient defense in the country.

The problem is that not all of Hummel's contributions, even on the offensive end, are quantifiable. Hummel's versatility as a point forward with 3-point range opened the lane for JaJuan Johnson and made it difficult to impossible to double the big man on the elbow and short post. Hummel drew a high number of fouls, distributed the ball well without turning it over, and was in many ways a glue guy who played with the efficiency of a star. Kramer's defense (and sneaky good, fourth-option-type offense) is also a major loss. Painter is a more than capable coach with more time than last year to figure out how to replace Hummel (and now Kramer), and he has a large amount of depth to utilize in that process. But it's hard to imagine these Boilermakers being as good as last year's pre-ACL version.

2. A healthy Kalin Lucas

It's no wonder Michigan State is ranked just behind Duke in just about everyone's preseason top 25. The Spartans went to their second-straight Final Four in 2009-10 without the help of their best player, guard Kalin Lucas, who was a contender for Big Ten Player of the Year until an Achilles tear forced him to the sidelines for the remainder of the season. The 2010-11 version gets Lucas -- and everyone not named Raymar Morgan and Chris Allen -- back. Toss in a talented recruiting class with at least one likely contributor (freshman Keith Appling) already in the mix, and you get a loaded, experienced team as talented as any in the country. The real draw, though, is Lucas -- how he recovers, how he leads, and how he closes his Michigan State career after being forced to watch from the sidelines during last year's triumphant and unexpected finish.

3. Bruce Weber's best team in years

Even in down years, Bruce Weber's teams did one thing. They defended. Weber is a defensive coach, and his ability to get his players to play stifling man-to-man defense out to 30 feet has been one reason why a lack of talent in the post-Deron Williams era hasn't gotten him in more trouble with his fan base. But no such problem exists this season: Illinois returns all five starters from last year's team. Three seniors, including All-Big Ten preseason pick Demetri McCamey, are back. Last year's two highly touted freshman -- Brandon Paul and Big Ten freshman of the year D.J. Richardson -- will look to make the freshman-to-sophomore leap. And another big-time recruiting class, including forward Jereme Richmond, the No. 23-ranked player in the class of 2010, shouldn't need much time to make an impact. There is no small amount of expectation surrounding this team: The Big Ten's media picked Illinois to finish fourth behind Michigan State, Ohio State and Purdue, and the Illini are ranked No. 13 in the AP preseason poll. That's a big jump in expectations for a defensively mediocre team that limped to an NIT finish last season, but it's a warranted one. Now Weber just has to remember how to get his guys to play defense. With all that talent, the offensive end -- and an NCAA tournament bid -- should take care of itself.

4. Ohio State freshman Jared Sullinger

Losing a high-usage player of the year like Evan Turner isn't the sort of thing your program is supposed to immediately overcome. But Sullinger, the No. 2-ranked player in the class of 2010, could push the 2010-11 version of the Buckeyes to be even better than last year's team. The four non-Turner starters -- versatile guards William Buford and David Lighty, sharpshooter Jon Diebler, and bruising center Dallas Lauderdale -- return. By plugging Sullinger (not to mention top small forward prospect DeShaun Thomas) in, Ohio State won't have to play four guards this season. They won't lack frontcourt depth when Lauderdale gets in foul trouble. They won't have to play their starters an insane number of minutes. And, if Sullinger plays to expectations, they'll have as effective a low-block scorer as any team in the country. It's hard to pick Ohio State over Michigan State to start the season, but by the end of it, Ohio State could very well deserve that distinction. They might just be the second-best team in the country.

5. Another ho-hum Wisconsin season

And rest assured, denizens of Madison: I mean "ho-hum" in the most complimentary way possible. This is a stat I've written before, but one that bears repeating: In Bo Ryan's tenure, the Badgers have failed to finish worse than fourth in the Big Ten exactly zero times. In nine seasons, the Badgers have failed to win 20 games only twice, and failed to win more than 24 games three times. The man and his program are models of consistency. That consistency hasn't exactly translated into tournament success; Ryan's teams have been past the second round of the NCAA tournament only three times in his tenure, and they've gotten past the Sweet 16 just once. But, still, how good must it feel to be a Wisconsin fan? To know, before the season even starts, that your team is going to be in the Big Ten mix?

That feeling shouldn't change this season. Wisconsin lost guards Trevon Hughes and Jason Bohannon, but it returned Jordan Taylor and potential Big Ten Player of the Year Jon Leuer, an efficient high-usage forward who rebounds on the defensive end and scores from everywhere on offense. He's perfect for Ryan's slow-swing system, and Ryan's system is perfect for the Big Ten. The Badgers will have to make sure last year's stellar turnover rate stays something near to stellar, and the loss of those experienced guards will be an early challenge, but would you wager, even in a very tough Big Ten, on a Bo Ryan team finishing outside the league's top four? There's no reason to start now.

For the next month or so, our friends at The Mag are previewing one high-profile school per day for their Summer Buzz series. For the sake of all that is synergistic, yours truly will be attempting the same, complementing each comprehensive Insider preview with some adjusted efficiency fun. Today's subject: Illinois. Up next? Purdue.

What happened to the Illinois defense?

For all the ups and downs of Bruce Weber's tenure at Illinois, there has always been one thing the Illini do well: defend. Weber's teams aren't hard to figure out, but they've always been consistent. They play tenacious man-to-man defense out to 30 feet. They lock down perimeter threats and hedge ball screens before rotating, recovering and forcing the offense to start all over again. They don't give you anything easy.

There's no junk involved, and very little zone. Weber's teams are defensively simple. They're also simply ruthless.

To wit, here are the defensive efficiency numbers of Weber's teams since his first season in Champaign (calculated as opposition's points per 100 possessions; tempo-free numbers courtesy of Ken Pomeroy):

• 2003-04: 92.1. Rank: 35. Record: 26-7.
• 2004-05: 87.4. Rank: 11. Record: 37-2.
• 2005-06: 90.5. Rank: 21. Record: 26-11.
• 2006-07: 84.7. Rank: 3. Record: 23-12.
• 2007-08: 89.9. Rank: 21. Record: 16-19.
• 2008-09: 86.5. Rank: 4. Record: 24-10.

Then, in 2009-10, something funky happened:

• 2009-10: 92.7. Rank: 49. Record: 21-15.

The Illini went from the fourth-ranked defense in 2008-09 to the 49th, in the process posting Weber's worst defensive coaching season in his seven-year Illinois career.

This can't be blamed on a dearth of talent. In the past, Weber's teams haven't needed talent to defend; those 16-19 Illini from 2007-08 may have been horrifically inept with the ball in their hands, not to mention one of the least athletic teams in the Big Ten, but they still held opponents to fewer points per possession than last year's squad.

"Demetri [McCamey] went to the Deron Williams Skills Academy and the LBJ Skills camp and he heard the same thing I told him all last season: you need to start guarding people," says Weber.

Illinois' perimeter defense was perhaps its weakest component last year -- the Illini didn't turn anyone over, and opposing teams scored 33.3 percent of their baskets against Illinois from beyond the arc. Some of that is surely McCamey's fault. As one of Illinois' veterans and a supposed team leader, McCamey had his fair share of disagreements with Weber throughout the season, and perhaps a lack of effort on the defensive end was one of the causes.

It also didn't help that Weber had to rely on two talented but inexperienced freshmen -- Brandon Paul and D.J. Richardson -- at backcourt positions for much of last season. Both players can score, but neither was a particularly adept defender; if you looked for it, you could see that confused "But I was helping over here!" look on walks back to timeouts pretty much every game. A year later, both players should be much better.

There is more talent on the way, too. Weber has long been criticized by some Illinois fans as an X's and O's guy who can't recruit, one who could coach up a group of second-tier players but couldn't land the talented in-state recruits Illinois churns up each and every year. No more. Paul and Richardson were big first steps. The coup de grace comes in the form of Jereme Richmond, the No. 4 small forward in the class of 2010. Richmond is known as a polished scorer who needs to add strength, but his length and athleticism should make an immediate impact on the defensive side of the ball.

Same goes for Meyers Leonard, a 7-foot center ranked No. 4 at his position in 2010, whose name sounds like a big four accounting firm. (That's not just me, right?) Leonard will be the strongest player on his team, and his sheer size should help bolster Illinois' interior and defensive rebounding.

What it all adds up to is a talented, experienced Illinois team adding a potentially elite scorer and some much needed interior girth. So, yeah, Illinois should be better at putting points on the board in 2010-11. That's always a bonus.

But where the Illini's season will really be made -- or broken -- is whether they can correct last year's ugly team defense. That answer will come down to this: Were the 2009-10 Illini a statistical outlier? Or simply a group that isn't all that good at playing defense, no matter how good their coach might be at teaching it?

If it's the latter, Illinois will be pretty good, but that's it. If it's the former, then Michigan State and Purdue won't be the only legitimate contenders for the Big Ten title. We'll see.