CHICAGO – The Illini entered Saturday’s game shooting 60.9 percent from the free-throw line, a clip just good enough for 10th place in the Big Ten, ahead of only Northwestern.

Illinois’ 10-of-22 performance from the free-throw line against Arizona dropped its season average to 58.8 percent and sunk the team to last in the conference in free-throw percentage.

“We didn’t hit the free throws,” coach Bruce Weber said. “We could have iced the game and taken control of the game.”

Of the six players who have started games for the Illini this season, only two have made more than 60 percent of their free throws.

And on Saturday, it was more than the difference in the game. Trent Meacham missed a free throw with 20 seconds left in regulation that would have put the Illini up by three.

“If I would have hit that last one in the game it probably would have been over,” Meacham said. “So there’s just a lot of little things like that that we got to work on.”

The Illini took a seven-point lead into halftime despite shooting just 6-of-10 from the line. In the second half and overtime period combined, though, the team made only 33 percent of its free throws (4-of-12).

“A lot of us missed free throws at the beginning of the game and it didn’t really hurt us at the beginning,” guard Calvin Brock said. “But down the stretch when the game was real close and we needed points on the board, it hurt us a lot.”

The Illini will have several chances to improve their free-throw shooting before the Big Ten season opens on Jan. 3. And the team still has a chance to improve its non-conference resume with a win against Missouri in the annual Braggin’ Rights game on Dec. 22.