It wasn’t easy, but Illini head coach John Groce tried to have a normal Sunday.

Before the bracket for the 2013 NCAA tournament was released, he went out for his usual morning coffee, ate lunch with his family and tried to avoid all the speculation that comes with Selection Sunday.

In the end, he was rewarded for his calm demeanor. The Illinois men’s basketball team received a seven seed in the southern region, drawing a first-round matchup with 10-seeded Colorado on Friday in Austin, Texas.

If the Illini were to advance to the Round of 32, they’d play the winner of 15-seeded Pacific and No. 2 Miami.

Experts had Groce’s team ranked between a seven seed and a nine seed in speculative brackets leading up to the selection show, but the Illini’s grueling Big Ten schedule was enough to warrant an easier road from the committee. Had Illinois drawn an eight or nine seed, it would have been forced to play the No. 1 seed in its region.

“Obviously an exciting day for our basketball team,” Groce said. “It’s certainly not satisfied because we have work to do, but I’m gratified for our guys.”

The team watched Sunday’s selection show from the football press box, and Groce mentally coached it for what to expect. The Illini knew they were sitting in a comfortable position after a strong finish to the season, but that confidence wasn’t always a given.

After Illinois missed the postseason entirely in the 2011-12 season under former head coach Bruce Weber, Groce made an NCAA tournament berth a priority from the moment he took the job. He passed out bracelets to each player and member of the coaching staff with tournament’s start date – 3/19/13 – etched into its undersized as a reminder of the team’s goal.

“It certainly was, so to speak, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow,” Groce said. “I asked them expressly not to stare at that pot of gold. We had to stare at each step and each thing that we faced.”

In the postgame press conference following Illinois’ buzzer-beating win over Minnesota in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament, Groce said his team knew many had written them off after losing seven of nine games to start the Big Ten season. On Sunday, senior guard Brandon Paul said that doubt makes this accomplishment even sweeter.

Paul understood the wristband’s message. On routine trips to Wal-Mart or walks around campus, he’d get stopped and asked what was on his wrist. He’d explain the significance regularly, and he never forgot what it meant or how he felt when his team missed the tournament a year earlier.

“We obviously didn’t want to just focus on the tournament. We wanted to get better every day,” Paul said. “But with that goal in mind, at the same time, it gave us a little bit of an edge.”

Illinois starts its postseason against Colorado, a team that finished fifth in the Pac-12 with a 10-8 record this season. The lone common opponent between the two teams is USC, who Illinois met in the Maui Invitational on Nov. 19 and defeated 94-64. Colorado met the Trojans on Jan. 10 and won at home, 66-60.

The Buffaloes defeated Oregon twice this season, both times while the Ducks were ranked as the No. 19 team in the country. They also defeated then-No. 9 Arizona 71-58 on Feb. 14. But Colorado also had its fair share of tough losses, dropping a nonconference matchup against Wyoming on Dec. 1 and to conference bottom-feeders Oregon State and Utah.

But anything can happen in the NCAA tournament. As Groce said, that’s what makes March the greatest time of year.

“From the very beginning when I met with them, they solidified this as something they wanted to do, as I talked in particular to our seniors,” Groce said. “And to see that come to fruition in a way in which they had to grind it out at really tough parts of the season when others doubted them, I think it’s a great life lesson.”

Despite Groce’s best effort, few would call it a normal Sunday.

Ethan can be reached at [email protected] and @AsOfTheSky.