Toughness Key To Success For Illinois Fighting Illini In Win Over Ohio State Buckeyes

As I said earlier this week, Illinois needed to win its game against Ohio State to have any chance of proving it deserves to be considered a contender in the Big Ten.

Well, the Fighting Illini came out and played like a team that has no intentions of being average in the conference this year, blasting the Buckeyes 74-55 on Saturday afternoon at Assembly Hall.

It’s still too early to engrave Illinois on the championship trophy, but the Fighting Illini are legit.

The key to their success against Ohio State was simple. They played hard and they displayed the kind of toughness that is required to survive in the best basketball conference in the nation.

Tracy Abrams epitomized that toughness when he crashed into the Ohio State bench chasing down a loose ball.

“Oh, I love it – that’s toughness plays, passion, inspiring plays,” Illinois head coach John Groce said in a post-game press conference. “Any time a guy sacrifices his body to make a play for his team, that’s the highest level of teamism – I don’t know if that’s a word.”

I’m pretty sure it’s not a word, but it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that Illinois, humbled after a conference-opening loss to Purdue, came out ready to go in a game it needed to win.

The No. 11 Fighting Illini got 19 points out of go-to guy Brandon Paul and they forced 16 turnovers en route to winning their 14th game of the season.

But just as it was silly to hit the panic  button after the loss to Purdue, it would be crazy to make too big of a deal out of a win over the No. 8 Buckeyes.

“I think we just needed this game in general,” Paul said in a post-game press conference. “I don’t know why, but people got crazy after our last loss. But it’s a long season.”

And Illinois still has a long way to go if it wants to win a Big Ten title.

Brian Lester is a featured Big Ten columnist and college basketball writer for Rant Sports. He is a member of the United States Basketball Writers Association as well.

Follow him on Twitter @BLester1993 or send him an email at [email protected].