By off-the-court standards, the 2014-15 Illinois basketball team had one of the strangest regular seasons in recent memory.

Unforeseen circumstances were a constant happening. First, there were injuries to key players. Before official practices even got underway, starting point guard Tracy Abrams tore his ACL in a fall workout. Leading scorer and rebounder Rayvonte Rice broke his hand two games into Big Ten play. Shooting guard Aaron Cosby suffered a retinal tear when he got poked in the eye against Indiana on Jan. 18.

There were off-court incidents as well. While they were sidelined with injuries, Rice and Cosby were both suspended for a violation of team rules. Cosby never made it back on the floor for the Illini, electing to transfer as he and head coach John Groce mutually agreed to part ways.

To their credit, the Illini continued to forge on despite each new scenario entering their stratosphere and did not suffer any drastic losing streaks like the ones that plagued the prior three seasons of Illinois hoops. But they are currently on the wrong side of the NCAA tournament bubble as they prepare for the Big Ten tournament, a fact that disappoints those who considered them tourney-bound before the season began.

Ironically, they are in this situation because during a season of off-court turmoil and uncertainty, the Illini’s on-court results became all too predictable.

I will be the first to admit that I had glowing preseason predictions and high hopes for Groce’s third Illini squad, and considered them to be a sure-fire tourney team. Early in the nonconference season, when Illinois was crushing opponents with a high-powered offensive attack and climbing into the Top 25 rank, it looked like those predictions would come true, but by the time Illinois suffered a demoralizing 77-70 defeat to Oregon at the United Center, the third loss in four games, it was apparent that expectations would need to be recalibrated. After all, the road to the NCAA tournament would not be easy.

With the difficult nature of conference play, the Illini would have to pull off a few unexpected wins and avoid “bad” losses to realistically compete for a tourney bid. They actually did an excellent job of avoiding bad losses, with their worst loss coming at Nebraska (RPI: 136) in just their second game adjusting to Rice’s absence. Illinois took care of all the cupcakes in the nonconference schedule, as well. When looking at the “bad loss” metric, Illinois’ season went almost entirely according to plan.

Yet the NCAA tournament selection committee values big wins as much, if not more, than bad losses. Even though the Illini avoided crucial losses, they rarely stole a game they were not supposed to win. In Groce’s first year at Illinois, he got his team to the tournament with wins over Gonzaga, Ohio State and of course, the victory over No. 1 Indiana. The Illini’s conference record that year was 8-10, but they simply had too many quality wins to be excluded from March Madness.

This year, the Illini picked up a great early-season win over Baylor and two of their biggest conference wins were crucial resume-builders against Maryland and at Michigan State. However, Maryland was ranked No. 11 at the time and still was only favored by two points over an Illini team playing their first game without Rice, so that upset was not as big of a shock as you might have thought. The Illini’s thrilling Feb. 7 road victory at Michigan State was somewhat canceled out by the loss they suffered to the Spartans at State Farm Center just two weeks later.

Outside of those games, it almost feels like the Big Ten results were penciled in before the conference season began. Illinois took care of Northwestern, Rutgers and Penn State like it was supposed to. The Illini lost where they tend to have lost most recently at places like Ohio State, Michigan and Wisconsin. They went 7-2 at home in conference play but only managed a 2-7 record on the road, including Saturday’s crushing loss at Purdue. After it looked like the Illini finally had with its victory in East Lansing, Mich., the team failed to capitalize, reverting back to the mean and going 3-3 in their final six games.

The Illini finished with a 9-9 conference record, good for an average finish in the Big Ten. Now they are where most average major-conference teams find themselves come March: the bubble.

The Big Ten tournament is the Illini’s last chance to make an impression on the tournament committee, but they will likely have to beat Wisconsin to earn a bid. Even playing above average will not get it done; they’ll have to be extraordinary.

Alex is a junior in AHS.

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