In each of Illinois’ last two games, there has been a second-half meltdown after impressive first halves. The two games were very different, but what we saw in each game shows that the Illini have yet to find their go-to player when times are tough.

Looking at last Tuesday’s contest at Purdue, Illinois got off to a good start. Starters and bench players were contributing, the defense was aggressive and the Illini just looked good while playing in a tough environment against a top-five team.

Illinois was able to go up by as many as nine points in the first half, and, despite trailing for a little, entered the break leading by two. An upset seemed to be a possibility in a place where upset wins rarely happen.

Then the second half hit.

After a good first few minutes, Purdue started to hit shots. Specifically, guard Jaden Ivey got into a groove and began hitting all sorts of tough shots over the Illini. The crowd got louder, and the Boilermakers soon began to pull away.

The Illini had no response defensively, but to be totally honest, it wasn’t even that their defense was bad. Ivey was hitting tough shots, and sharpshooter Sasha Stefanovic also hit some threes with a hand in his face. 

The problem was the offense.

It all of a sudden looked like the Illini couldn’t hit water if they fell out of a boat. Alfonso Plummer, who had a very good first half, went ice cold. Da’Monte Williams, Trent Frazier, Jacob Grandison and every other shooter also couldn’t hit. It was brutal.

All-American center Kofi Cockburn also was not effective for a 10-minute period in the second half, being disrupted by Boilermaker bigs or sitting on the bench. That’s not what you expect out of your supposed national player of the year candidate.

The Illini did start scoring a little at the end, including Kofi making some inside moves, but they weren’t able to cut into Purdue’s lead enough and ultimately lost by 16.

I don’t blame Illinois for losing to a team ranked higher than them on the road, especially with the matchup situation at hand. However, I hoped it would have been closer. But when you don’t have someone to stop a big run and you’re playing a squad with the talent that Purdue has, you’re gonna lose big.

Now onto the Super Bowl Sunday match at home against Northwestern.

Once again, the first half was very impressive. Since the Wildcats have far less talent than the Illini do and the game was in Champaign, it was easy to tell by the scoreboard.

The Illini led by 14 at the break, with Plummer once again having a great first half. Kofi was also playing well down low. Then, once again, things got ugly.

Illinois led by as many as 18 points early in the second half, but that didn’t last long. Northwestern was able to use a 19-2 run to find themselves down just one point with just over six minutes to play.

It was very similar to the Purdue game, except this time, the defense was much worse. That’s not the focus of this story, though.

Plummer, Grandison and Williams once again couldn’t hit anything. Frazier wasn’t taking the shots he usually was, and we saw a problem from the beginning of the season come back. Turnovers.

When Andre Curbelo is bad, he gets sloppy and turns the ball over. That was on display in the second half against Northwestern. When Kofi got the ball down low, his usual double-team came. But, he didn’t react well and had a game-high six turnovers. 

Eventually, Plummer hit a three and Kofi had some inside baskets, which stopped the bleeding. RJ Melendez went perfect from the charity stripe late, and the Illini won the game by seven. Illinois got it done, but it wasn’t pretty. 

Once again, no one stepped up to avoid a big run by the other team. Williams and Grandison kept shooting the ball when open, which was good, but we saw miss after miss. Plummer also airballed two threes and missed two free throws in crunch time in the second half, something we haven’t seen out of him all year.

I wrote after the game that I thought Trent may have been feeling some effects from when he came out of the game against Purdue with an apparent leg injury because he wasn’t taking as many shots as usual, but that wasn’t confirmed. I’m not too sure what was going on with him because he still played 33 minutes.

Kofi, on the other hand, was fully healthy and couldn’t find a way to be productive against an undersized team for double-digit minutes. It was hard to watch.

With two tough games coming up, at Rutgers on Wednesday and at No. 19 Michigan State on Saturday, it’s hard to feel encouraged. The second-half slump at Purdue turned a close game that Illinois potentially could have won into a blowout loss, and a bad 10-minute stretch against Northwestern made a blowout win into a much closer game than it should have been.

To me, the problem falls with not having a go-to guy. Earlier this season, it looked to be Trent Frazier. Against both Nebraska and Michigan, he was able to run close games into double-digit Illini wins. But we haven’t seen the same consistent Trent over the past seven games.

Williams led the nation in 3-point percentage last season, but most of his shots were created by his teammates. Alfonso Plummer is the best shooter on the team, but he has been face-guarded a lot tougher as of late. And, he has the ability to take tough shots, but it’s not always what you want to rely on when you need a basket.

Kofi really should be the guy that Illinois goes to when they need a basket in a tough time. Unfortunately, though, Kofi hasn’t performed his best when playing against skilled big men. And, when you’re going against a smart defensive coach like Chris Collins of Northwestern, Kofi hasn’t proven he can make his own offense consistently.

Illinois is alone atop the Big Ten Conference right now because they play very good team basketball — most of the time. When they do, they’re almost impossible to guard. We’ve seen times where Frazier, Plummer and other shooters are all hitting, which makes it easier for Kofi to be effective down low, and vice versa. 

We have seen times, though, like against Purdue and Northwestern or earlier this season against Cincinnati, when Illinois has gone on ugly runs because it doesn’t have someone to get a basket when it’s desperate. 

I do think that if Illinois doesn’t find their guy soon it’ll be hard to make it to the second weekend of the NCAA tournament. Shooters are going to have bad days, and teams are going to make a plan for Kofi. Could the whole team catch fire all at once and spark Illinois to make a deep run? Sure. But you can’t rely on that.

So, someone’s going to have to step up. Who might that be? Unfortunately, I don’t have the answer to that question. In fact, I doubt head coach Brad Underwood and crew have a sure-fire answer to that question right now, either. 

Either way, if someone doesn’t step up in tough stretches, I think Illinois will be in trouble late in the season. Who is it going to be? I hope we find out soon.

The Illini have a tough schedule to end the regular season before the Big Ten and NCAA tournaments, so they still have an opportunity to figure it out.

@JPietsch14

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