HOUSTON — Illinois is the road team in more ways than one on Thursday night when the Fighting Illini play in the South Region semifinal against the Houston Cougars.
The University of Houston campus is less than three miles from the Toyota Center, where Illinois and Houston play in a purported “neutral site” game with a spot in the Elite Eight on the line.
Illinois coach Brad Underwood said he can’t complain, partially because of a rough March that featured a loss in the Big Ten tournament quarterfinal to Wisconsin.
“I couldn’t care less. And I’m going to sound really kind of selfish here. I’m an old JuCo ball coach. I drove 16-passenger vans. I drove from Dodge City, Kansas, to Mesa, Arizona, for a basketball game, for a tournament, in a bus,” Underwood said.
“If you had told me back then that I’m getting to coach basketball in the Sweet 16 and play Houston, I would sign up for it, I would crawl to get there. If we want to beat them, no matter where we play them, we would have to play great. Guess what? We’re going to have to do that (Thursday). And I think they’re going to have to play well if they want a chance to beat us.”
Illinois senior point guard Kylan Boswell believes fans will be there to represent the Fighting Illini at gametime.
Jake Davis, the shaggy-haired reserve with a smooth 3-point stroke, tipped his cap to Houston for earning the higher seed to set up the scenario. Illinois was viewed as a No. 2 seed last month and had a chance to hopscotch from Champaign to St. Louis for first- and second-round games, then to Chicago for a regional semifinal and final. But Purdue’s push to win the Big Ten tournament and the Illini fade brought them to Texas instead.
“They’re the higher seed, so it is what it is,” Davis said. “I think we’ve been battle tested throughout the year on the road. I think we played really well on the road against good teams in their place. I don’t think this is anything different. We’re coming here to win with that mindset.”
–Fan reaction might be a consideration for Nebraska guard Pryce Sandfort on Thursday.
The Cornhuskers’ leading scorer (17.9 points per game) transferred from Iowa when the Hawkeyes fired head coach Fran McCaffrey and brought in Ben McCollum.
Sandfort has 38 points, and 10 3-pointers, in the NCAA Tournament for the Cornhuskers. Nebraska might have been expecting to see No. 1 seed Florida on Thursday evening, but Iowa pulled an upset Sunday night to set up the all-Big Ten semifinal in the South. The winner could play another Big Ten team, No. 3 seed Illinois, or Houston on Saturday.
Sandfort had 15 points in Nebraska’s overtime win on March 8 against Iowa and was just 3 of 7 with 13 points in his return to Carver-Hawkeye Arena in February. Iowa won that one, 62-57.
“I’m not really sure,” Sandfort said of how Iowa fans might react to him during the game Thursday. “It’s not something I’m focused on. We’re treating the game as any other game. Same approach as we’ve had all season and just kind of block out that outside noise.”
When McCollum took over, only two players stayed from the 2024-25 roster. But he was born and raised in Iowa and last coached at Drake, not very far removed from the feel of in-state and border rivalries.
“Growing up around it, obviously there’s Iowa, Iowa State, and Nebraska are all kind of rivals,” he said. “Usually you probably — none of us like any of each other is kind of how it works. So I don’t know that it’s going to excite it any more. It’s one of those things that when you grow up around it, you understand it, you get it.”
–Houston coach Kelvin Sampson has prominent freshmen in his rotation, a blend Arkansas coach John Calipari can relate to with his current team and previous iterations at Kentucky.
Sampson joked that coaching a team with four freshmen in the rotation might be taking years at a time off of his life expectancy.
“This profession does that to you,” Calipari said. “But the reward in it is what Kelvin is seeing, what I see in this team, and the joy I get from what I do is when someone says I knew Darius Acuff was good, but I never realized he was that good. I knew Meleek Thomas was good, but I never knew he was this good.
“I knew Trevon Brazile had this in him, but I had not seen it in a while. Billy Goat, two different cities said we watched him and he was good, but he was never this good. Seeing D.J. (Wagner), having people call me and say he’s impacting winning for your team as much as anyone on it, having all that — seeing Malique Ewin doing stuff he’s never done, effort, energy, scoring double-doubles in real games, nothing makes me happier.
“But winning is the next phase of that. If you get them all right, they will want to win to keep playing. That’s why I always say it’s about the name on the back, not the name on the front. You can say all that stuff, but at the end of the day, it’s are you getting your guys — and Kelvin, who’s a dear friend, what he’s done with those freshmen, I mean, I recruited both of them. They’re good. And they’re even better than I thought they were.”
–Tommy Lloyd spent time praising the “swag” and player development track record of Calipari, No. 1 seed Arizona’s opponent Thursday in San Jose. But only after sharing that he was once an aspiring DJ.
“I can talk about that all day,” Lloyd said.
“I have been able to develop a great relationship with Mike Schwartz, AKA Mix Master Mike, who’s a Bay Area guy who will be in the building for the game. He’s one of the best DJs of all time. Happened to run with the Beastie Boys for a lot of years, and it’s no secret I’ve always loved the Beastie Boys. It’s been a little bit of a, I guess — I don’t know if a childhood fantasy but probably a manhood fantasy for me that’s come true. So it’s been awesome to have that relationship.”
Lloyd said he spent time with Schwartz at his studio and his fandom went to another level.
“You see a true artist at work, and it’s crazy how talented people are,” Lloyd said.
