Northwestern had no answers for Marcus Domask on Tuesday night.
The Illinois basketball team hosted Northwestern basketball on Tuesday night, and it was expected to be a close contest. The Fighting Illini are a top-10 team, but the Wildcats were 10-2 and they are the only team that has beaten #1 Purdue this season. the spread favored Illinois by 5.5 in this one, but it ended up being absolute domination. The Fighting Illini went on to win the game by 30 points as they destroyed Northwestern, 96-66.
Illinois basketball fans were concerned with how the team was going to look after the recent news regarding Terrance Shannon Jr. Shannon Jr. was one of the best players on the team, but he was recently dismissed from the program. Someone had to pick up the slack, and the player that did it was Marcus Domask.
Marcus Domask absolutely went off for Illinois on Tuesday night. He finished as the game’s leading scorer as he dropped 32 points on 11/15 shooting, and Northwestern didn’t have an answer for him. Wildcats head coach Chris Collins called what the Fighting Illini did on Tuesday ‘booty ball.’
“They play very similar to Penn State last year and how they used (Jalen) Pickett,” Chris Collins said, according to an article from Sports Illustrated. “… I guess we call it booty ball around here.”
Last season, Illinois fell victim to the ‘booty ball’ tactic against Penn State, and that is presumably what Collins was referencing. ‘Booty ball’ is the ability to back people down in the lane, and it can be very difficult to guard. Illinois head coach Brad Underwood noted that last season.
“It’s really, really hard to guard,” Brad Underwood said last season, according to an article from Nittany Sports Now. “When you can keep possession of the ball for 12, 13 seconds and just keep backing up, and you have no recourse in how you guard it because you can’t touch them, it becomes very challenging.”
This season, Illinois was able to use the tactic to their advantage, and it worked extremely well. The Fighting Illini are once again having a very impressive season as they are now 11-2 (2-0) on the year. They will be back in action on Friday for a massive game on the road against #1 Purdue.
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