Arizona 78, Illinois 72, OT: I-L-L, N-I-T

Going into Saturday’s game, I wasn’t expecting Illinois to beat Arizona. But to have the game in your back pocket for 39 minutes and give it away is a hell of a way to lose.

In a game that will probably turn out to have been a must-win for Illinois’ NCAA tournament hopes, the Illini kept Arizona scoreless for the first five full minutes with stifling defense, then maintained a double-digit lead until midway through the second half, then slowly let it slip away and fell apart in the final minute, giving Arizona its first lead with exactly 60 seconds left.

You can blame the officiating – more on that later – but Illinois had plenty of chances to put the game away without letting it slide into overtime, where Arizona got a win by outplaying the Illini for five minutes after failing to do so for the better part of 40.

So this game will serve as the symbol of what is quickly becoming Bruce Weber’s legacy: Teams that play their hearts out and fall just a little bit short of potential. From the 2005 championship game, to the failure to secure a Big Ten title the next year, to the first-ever quarterfinal loss (to lower-seeded Michigan State) in the year’s conference tournament, to the last-minute upset by Washington in that year’s NCAA tourney, to the giveaway of the 2007 tourney game against Virginia Tech, to this year’s Arizona game, Weber’s teams fall just short as consistently as a Shaun Pruitt free throw.

And that brings us to the chief way in which Illinois could have secured a win: by hitting free throws late. Illinois shot 10 of 22 from the line – 10 of 22! – with seniors Pruitt and Brian Randle both missing shots late that could have put the game just out of Arizona’s reach. OK, so Arizona made more free throws than Illinois shot, but the Illini still had their chance to win.

And that brings us to the officiating. They clearly blew it at the end of the game when they failed to call a technical on Arizona’s attempt to call time out with none left. While Illinois may have only one player (Trent Meacham) who can actually hit a free throw, you only need one to win right there. But overall, while Arizona had a 10-shot advantage in free throw attempts (32 to 22), I left there were blown calls and non-calls both ways.

All of this, incidentally, negated an outstanding effort by Illinois on the defensive end. I’m not going to bother looking up the last time Arizona was held to a mere 61 points in regulation, but it hasn’t happened this year (although, in fairness, Kansas held them to 62 in a game the Jayhawks would go on to win in two overtimes). Several players deserve individual accolades for the effort, but the most surprising to me was Randle, who was finally starting to play like a senior until he kind of disappeared down the stretch.

So now Illinois will go 9-4 in the non-conference season, because there’s no way they’re going to beat Missouri. They could manage to build a 10-8 record in a soft Big Ten, but that still leaves them with no signature non-conference wins on their NCAA resume. With so many mid-majors playing well this year, that will be not even close to enough. Needing a strong showing in the Big Ten tournament, I predict the Illini will lose in a quarterfinal, probably to Purdue and former Weber assistant Matt Painter, in a snapshot of what the Illini could be.