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Brad Underwood’s tight rotation era may be over
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- Brad Underwood’s tight rotation era may be over
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Illinois' newcomers are settling in fast — fast enough to make head coach Brad Underwood stress over how to allocate his minutes.
In his decade as Illinois head coach, Underwood usually sticks to a seven, maybe eight-man rotation. With the amount of depth and talent on his roster, that might look a little different this year.
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After three exhibition games and the regular-season opener, Illini fans have started to get a better idea of which new pieces in the roster are going to prove themselves as most vital this season, and where they fit in the rotation.
With David Mirkovic still sidelined, head coach Brad Underwood's go-to rotation isn't set in stone quite yet, but he's taken the exhibition games as an opportunity to experiment and find out which groups of Illini he trusts the most out on the floor.
To nobody's surprise, five-star freshman Quentin Coleman and returners Andrej Stojakovic, Tomislav Ivisic and Jake Davis started three of Illinois' first four games, with three-star freshman Lincoln Williams starting against UIC while Stojakovic stayed sidelined with injury.
To almost everyone's surprise, three-star freshman Ethan Brown earned a spot in the starting lineup in all four games. It's clear that he quickly gained Underwood's respect in the offseason through hard work and consistency, and Underwood's decision has paid off: Through those four starts, Brown has tallied 46 points, 16 assists, 21 rebounds and five steals. To put that into perspective, Coleman has racked up 57 points, 23 assists, 31 rebounds and six steals.
It's unclear which starting spot Mirkovic will step into at the moment. Excluding the FDU season opener, in which Jake Davis exited with an injury after just five minutes, Brown and Davis have seen similar usage. Both played 24 minutes against Cincinnati, Davis played 13 more minutes than Brown against Baylor and Brown played 10 more minutes than Davis against UIC.
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One of them will likely step to the sixth or seventh man role, but after Providence transfer Stefan Vaaks' 20-point, five 3-pointer game against FDU, where does he fit into the picture? Many Illini fans anticipated Vaaks as an immediate starter, but even without the starting spot, he's been putting up starter-worthy point totals. He hasn't surpassed 21 minutes in any of the four games, yet he's notched 67 points combined, which leads the squad given Stojakovic's missed game.
Illini fans are left to assume his defending and rebounding efforts play a major role in keeping him out of the starting five. For now, he's still making the most out of his time on the floor with his ability to knock down long-range shots.
On to the big men, Tomislav Ivisic remains Underwood's go-to down low, but seems to be seeing fewer minutes this season as third-year Jason Jakstys has carved himself out a role.
Excluding the Baylor exhibition that saw both Tomislav and Zvonimir Ivisic exit with injury, Tomislav has earned 58 minutes and Jakstys has earned 38 minutes. Zvonimir also missed the UIC exhibition with injury, but tallied a total of 20 minutes across the FDU and Cincinnati matchups. Jakstys earning a spot in the rotation is a good sign, but it also lowers the ceiling for Zvonimir Ivisic by quite a bit. At this rate, Zvonimir Ivisic will be seeing a seven-minute decrease in minutes per game compared to last season.
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As for the rest of the freshmen, it's still tough to tell. Kankakee native Lincoln Williams earned the starting spot in Stojakovic's absence in the UIC exhibition, eventually exiting four minutes in due to a groin injury that also kept him out of the FDU opener. But against Cincinnati, Wisconsin Gatorade Player of the Year Zavier Zens and Landon Davis earned more minutes than him.
When David Mirkovic returns from injury, expect Williams and Zens to lead the way with Lucas Morillo and Landon Davis trailing close behind.
If injuries continue to pile up mid-season, Illinois will be in good hands. When Big Ten play arrives, Underwood may gravitate toward a much tighter rotation, but a roster this deep could force him to rethink his philosophy.
