Free admission, the opportunity for autographs and a two-game road winning streak attracted 4,175 fans to the Illinois women’s basketball team’s annual “Pack the Hall” promotion Sunday, but the Illini were unable to send the season-high crowd home with a victory against Michigan State.
The physical frontcourt of the Spartans (14-2, 2-1 Big Ten) took advantage of a rare off-game by Illini forward Karisma Penn and of Illinois’ overall lack of size to outlast Illinois (9-7, 2-2) 79-75.
Michigan State jumped out to a 13-point lead with 9:03 remaining in the first half, but Illinois slowly came back and took its first and only lead with 9:09 remaining in regulation. The Spartans responded with a 13-0 run, and the Illini were able to cut the lead to four multiple times, but the Michigan State frontcourt proved to be too much.
Senior Adrienne GodBold tried to will Illinois to a victory with a career-high 28 points, eight rebounds, four steals and three blocks, but a 27-rebound deficit and 21 team fouls made Illinois’ comeback bid fall short.
“It’s tough. We tried our best to leave it out on the floor,” GodBold said. “And to get the loss, it hurts, but it just gives us more heart and more of a mindset to work harder next game.”
Get The Daily Illini in your inbox!
Illinois head coach Matt Bollant said Illinois’ man-to-man defense was not good enough against the Spartans.
“In the end, we just didn’t get enough stops,” Bollant said. “If you’re going to be a good basketball team, you’ve got to get stops. We scored enough points. For us to shoot 50 percent in the game and lose is disappointing because we didn’t defend the way we’re capable of defending.”
Michigan State grabbed 49 rebounds and had almost as many offensive rebounds (21) as Illinois had total (22). The Spartans were able to score 18 second-chance points and 40 points in the paint. Two Spartan forwards, Courtney Schiffauer and Jasmine Hines, were able to record double-doubles. Schiffauer scored 11 points with 11 rebounds, while Hines recorded 18 points and grabbed 13 rebounds, including eight offensive boards, in 22 minutes.
Bollant said Ohio State and Northwestern — Illinois’ two most recent victims — both have similar size to Michigan State.
“It’s interesting how some games you can step up and play some big, physical teams and do great and today we didn’t.” Bollant said. “Obviously, part of that was KP getting in foul trouble. We just didn’t defend and rebound physically the way we need to.”
Illinois played without junior forward Kersten Magrum, who is suffering from a concussion. Magrum has had multiple concussions in the past that have led her missing both practice time this offseason and games over the past three seasons. Magrum has attributed her multiple concussions to being undersized (6-foot-1) in the post. She also missed time earlier this season with a shoulder injury.
“That hurt us today,” Bollant said. “Because she can rebound and defend against bigger kids, and other kids had to step into that role and do things that they hadn’t done before.”
Magrum’s injury and Penn’s foul trouble forced Illinois to go to a lineup of GodBold, junior Amber Moore, sophomores Ivory Crawford, Alexis Smith and Taylor Tuck. At 6-foot, Tuck was the only 6-footer for Illinois against a Michigan State lineup that many times featured three players 6-foot-1 or taller.
Crawford and Moore both finished in double figures for the Illini with 16 and 13 points, respectively. Penn failed to reach double digits in scoring for the first time this season after committing five fouls in 23 minutes.
Illinois was coming off of consecutive Big Ten road wins for the first time since 2004. In their last home game, the Illini fell to then-No. 14 Purdue in overtime 67-66. Illinois is now 3-2 with GodBold in the lineup. The Illini are recieving votes in the AP Top 25 poll for the first time since 2009, and they haven’t been ranked since they were No. 24 in November 2000.
The Spartans were coming off a 76-55 loss to No. 9 Penn State on Jan. 6. Coming into the week, the Spartans touted the No. 2 scoring defense in the nation, allowing a Big Ten-low 45.6 points per game, and the most points Michigan State had allowed a single opponent was 60 points in its loss at then-No. 19 Dayton on Dec. 8. But Michigan State allowed its two opponents this week, Penn State and Illinois, 76 and 75 points, respectively.
Johnathan can be reached at [email protected] and on twitter @jhett93.
