It’s supposed to be tough to win a Big Ten championship, but until Tuesday night Illinois didn’t understand how tough.
Rallying from a 13-point halftime deficit, the fourth-ranked Illini stunned No. 19 Wisconsin 68-67 on Marcus Griffin’s jump shot in the lane over Maurice Linton with less than one second remaining. With the Illini trailing 67-66 and only :02 on the clock, Griffin took an inbounded lob pass from Sean Harrington and sent his shot through the hoop to increase Illinois’ (20-5 overall, 10-2 Big Ten) first-place lead over idle Michigan State to 1 1/2 games.
“I diagrammed the play in the huddle,” Wisconsin coach Brad Soderberg said. “We defended it exactly the way we wanted to defend it. And a great player made a great play.”
Behind Griffin, who scored 11 of his 18 points in the second half, Brian Cook, who scored 13 of his 16 after the break and Frank Williams, who had 18 of his game-high 22 after intermission, the Illini took their first lead since 3-2 when Griffin sank two free throws at the 2:14 mark. Linton’s reverse layup and Roy Boone’s fastbreak layup gave Wisconsin (15-7, 6-5) a brief 65-62 edge but a Cook follow cut the gap to 65-64 with one minute remaining. A Griffin follow of a Frank Williams airball made it 66-65 Illinois but the Badgers’ Kirk Penney was fouled on a drive with 9.5 seconds to go. He made both free throws to set up the dramatic ending.
Cory Bradford’s NCAA record streak of games with a three-point basket was stopped at 88.
Before the game, Illinois coach Bill Self expressed his admiration for the way the defensive-minded Badgers are able to run time off the clock on both offense and defense.
“They play the entire 35 seconds on both ends of the floor,” Self had said. “We have to be more patient than we’ve been all year.”
By patience, though, Self didn’t mean Illinois should hardly even score. That’s exactly what the Illini did, however, in the first half. Looking totally out of rhythm, Illinois fell behind 15-6 in the first 10 minutes and looked as if it never would recover.
After a timeout with 10:17 to go, Illinois picked up the pace offensively and Frank Williams made two layups in a row to cut the deficit to 15-10. The Badgers answered that with another flurry, however, and with 5:31 left their lead was 23-14. Consecutive three-pointers by Boone, Penney and Mark Vershaw in the last 90 seconds before the break made it Wisconsin 35, Illinois 22. It was the Illini’s second-largest halftime deficit of the year. Illinois fell behind Seton Hall 42-25 on Dec. 9 and rallied to win in overtime.
The Badgers (15-9, 6-5) dominated the first 20 minutes on both ends of the floor. Wisconsin went 6 for 9 from behind the arc and made 61 percent of its field goal attempts while holding the Illini to a season-low 22 points.
Illinois continued to tread water early in the second half. In the first seven minutes the Illini held Wisconsin to only seven points but only sliced three points off their deficit to 42-32. The Badgers answered another Illinois run with three-pointers by Boone and Penney. With 12 minutes left, Bradford still had only two points and forward Robert Archibald had contributed one lone free throw.
Finally, with 7:09 to go, the Illini started to make the Badgers sweat. A layup and two free throws by Cook and two free throws by Frank Williams cut Wisconsin’s lead to 51-48. Cook had accounted for 10 of Illinois’ first 26 points after the break. A clutch three-pointer by Penney, however, silenced the crowd and made it 54-48 with six minutes left. Williams answered with a three of his own, though, to trim the gap to 54-51.
McClain fouled out a few seconds later. He exited with only two points. A layup by Williams with 5:15 to go brought Illinois within 55-53 but two Charlie Wills free throws made it 57-53.
Finally, the Illini caught up. A three by Williams and a free throw with 3:32 left tied things at 59-59.
