Houston– David Mirkovic He had 14 points and 10 rebounds, and was seeded third. Illinois Used their defensive prowess to knock last year’s national runner-up out of the NCAA Tournament houston 65-55 Thursday night in the South Region semifinals.
The next meeting will be with the ninth seeded players on Saturday. iowa To see which Big Ten team will advance to the Final Four. This will be the 11th Elite Eight appearance for Illinois (27-8) and its second in three seasons under Brad Underwood.
Appearing in the Sweet 16 for the seventh consecutive time, the second-seeded Cougars (30-7) were thrilled to play just two miles from their campus. But his poor shooting did little to please Houston fans and the orange-clad Illini faithful who made the long trip to Texas.
“The Houston fans were a little loud at the beginning of the game, but as the game went on, [our fans] Started speaking out loudly in my city,” Mirkovic said. ”So it’s really important for us, I would say it’s like the wind at our back. They pushed us and thanks to them.”
star freshman point guard Kingston FlemingsThe expected NBA lottery pick had 11 points on 4-of-10 shooting. Milos Uzan Made only 2 shots out of 11.
But they were far from the only cougars to struggle aggressively. The team shot only 34% in its lowest scoring game of the season.
Underwood was asked about his team’s defensive performance.
“I think it’s a mental focus,” he said. “We’ve been very good defensively at times. It’s just kind of keeping it up. We have very capable defenders, we have size and length, and we just have to make shots tough.”
Illinois performed well on Thursday with an average of 84.7 points. But its attack was still powerful enough to send Houston back to its nearest compound. Keaton Wagler Had 13 points and a team-high 12 rebounds for the Illini; According to ESPN Research, he and Mirkovic became the first pair of freshmen to achieve a double-double in the same NCAA Tournament game since freshmen became fully eligible in 1972–73.
“Coach was telling us before the game: ‘It’s going to be a guard game to get rebounds. We need more than 10 guards,'” he said. “So I accepted that challenge. I went out there, tried to play as hard as I could, didn’t let them get any second chances. I went out there and tried to get every rebound I could.”
Andrej Stojakovic — with his father, three-time NBA All-Star Peja Stojakovic, in the stands — also scored 13.
By the time the final seconds closed, many Houston fans had already filed out and Illinois supporters were left standing and cheering while their team celebrated.
“I’m proud of our kids’ effort,” Houston coach Kelvin Sampson said. “We didn’t perform well enough.”
The Illini were ahead by one point early in the second half, when they went on a 17–0 run to take a 44–26 lead with about 12 minutes remaining. jake davis Mirkovic scored five points, including a 3-pointer, during the burst ben hamrichs Finished it with consecutive 3s.
As Illinois took the lead, the Cougars missed seven consecutive shots. When Uzan finally ended Houston’s drought with a 3-pointer with 11:20 remaining, it had been nearly seven minutes since the team had scored.
“We were getting stops and we were limiting them to one shot, even the tough shots,” Wagler said. “Getting them to shoot tough middies or compete at the rim, 3-pointers, all that, and then us going inside and grabbing rebounds and offensively we were getting the shots we wanted, we were knocking them down.”
Consecutive 3-pointers by chase mccarty Reached Houston just before nine with about six minutes to spare. But Wagler and Tomislav Ivicic Made 3-pointers to cap an 8-0 run that increased the lead to 58-41.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
