Illinois basketball heads to Maryland looking for better showing against Terps: “Probably our worst game of the season”
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CHAMPAIGN (WCIA) — Illinois basketball heads to Maryland for a Saturday afternoon showdown against a team that beat them in Champaign last month. The Terps (14-11, 6-8 B1G) handed the 14th-ranked Illini (18-6, 9-4 B1G) one of their two home losses of the season on Jan. 14, with the visitors walking out of State Farm Center with a 79-67 victory. It’s a game the team says it hasn’t forgotten as it heads to College Park for a 4:30 p.m. tip in a nationally televised game on FOX.
"It was bad, probably our worst game of the season"#Illini are still not happy with a home loss to Maryland last month. Now they go to College Park to play the Terps, a team Illinois has struggled to beat recently. Brad Underwood just 2-7 against Maryland in his Illini tenure pic.twitter.com/j5T8x67IZ0
— Bret Beherns (@WCIA3Bret) February 16, 2024
“It was bad, probably our worst game of the season,” Illinois senior forward Quincy Guerrier said. “Just our energy, focus, attention to details. We can’t let Jahmir Young get 30 points like he did last game and we’ve got to stop Julian Reese as well.”
Young scored a game high 28 in the first meeting, with Reese adding 20. The Illini shot just 33% from the field, going 6-for-22 from 3 (27%), scoring just 67 points, the third lowest total of the season.
“Maybe as poor as we’ve played and they had something to do with that but we weren’t very connected, just all over the place in the first game so I hope we’re a little more focused and dialed in,” Illinois head coach Brad Underwood said.
Maryland has presented plenty of challenges to Underwood in his time at Illinois, going just 2-7 against the Terps, including an 0-3 mark in College Park. Despite being picked third in the Big Ten Preseason Poll (Illinois was 4th), the Terps are struggling this season, sitting tied for 10th in the league with a 6-8 mark in league play.
“They’ve got really good players and for whatever the reason, it was a game we didn’t play very well and we were about as cold as it was outside that day and that’s no excuse, we’ve got to play better,” Underwood said when asked about the struggles against Maryland through the years.
Tip time is 4:30 p.m. on Saturday afternoon from Xfinity Center in College Park.
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