Hour and 20 minutes before tip-off. Nate Mason was warming up 15 minutes ago but is in the locker room right now as just the bigs are on the court. I'd guess that he plays.
Pregame reads:
Illinois has a new head coach in Brad Underwood who won an impressive 89 games with Stephen F. Austin in three years before going to Oklahoma State, where he went to the NCAA Tournament and then left after a year for Illinois. Illinois is a good, not great team that's better defensively than they are offensively. Power forward LeRon Black is definitely the best player. He's a strong, explosive power forward that scores on all three levels. Illinois has struggled rebounding as Black is an average rebounder, center Michael Finke doesn't rebound well and he's more of a stretch 5 whose production comes away from the basket, and there are no solid bigs on the bench. Illinois' backcourt has struggled shooting the ball, but there are three young and talented scoring perimeter players on the bench in Trent Frazier, Kipper Nichols, and Aaron Jordan. The Illini have a deep bench with nine players playing at least 16 minutes per game.
Pregame reads:
Illinois has a new head coach in Brad Underwood who won an impressive 89 games with Stephen F. Austin in three years before going to Oklahoma State, where he went to the NCAA Tournament and then left after a year for Illinois. Illinois is a good, not great team that's better defensively than they are offensively. Power forward LeRon Black is definitely the best player. He's a strong, explosive power forward that scores on all three levels. Illinois has struggled rebounding as Black is an average rebounder, center Michael Finke doesn't rebound well and he's more of a stretch 5 whose production comes away from the basket, and there are no solid bigs on the bench. Illinois' backcourt has struggled shooting the ball, but there are three young and talented scoring perimeter players on the bench in Trent Frazier, Kipper Nichols, and Aaron Jordan. The Illini have a deep bench with nine players playing at least 16 minutes per game.
