Illinois basketball made all kinds of brutal history in a 110-67 embarrassment against the No. 3 Duke Blue Devils at Madison Square Garden. Not only did the Fighting Illini suffer their worst loss in program history on Saturday night, but stat guru Jared Berson reports “it’s the largest margin of defeat for the Big Ten in a home/neutral non-conference game over the last 75 years.”
Berson adds that the 43-point margin is the largest against a Big Ten opponent in non-conference play since 2000, when Duke beat Michigan by 43 points at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Finally, Berson notes this: “It gets a little dicey with the war years…but seems safe to say it’s the worst loss in a home/neutral non-conference game by a Big Ten team since UChicago lost by 47 to DePaul at home during the 1942-43 season.”
Needless to say, this highly anticipated trip to MSG was a total disaster for Illinois basketball, which has been slipping since an impressive start to the season. This is a team that went to Oregon and earned a historic 32-point victory, seemingly stamping itself as a title contender. But a variety of issues, including on the health front, have derailed the once-promising campaign.
This Duke game wasn’t competitive from the very beginning. The Blue Devils raced out to a 12-4 lead and never looked back, leading by 17 points at halftime and then totally blowing things open in the second half. The Fighting Illini missed their first 17 3-point attempts and finished 2-of-26 from long distance.
Illinois basketball has now lost three games in a row, including a total collapse at home against Michigan State and a blowout loss at Wisconsin. The Fighting Illini now sit at 17-11 overall and 9-8 in Big Ten play, and a spot on the bubble could be in play if things continue over the last three games of the regular season and the Big Ten Tournament. A home tilt up next against the Iowa Hawkeyes is close to a must-win at this point.
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