00:00You have the emotion of Connecticut getting to the Final Four
00:05with that wild win last weekend against Duke.
00:08But the oddsmakers are certainly telling us
00:11that they are not the better team in this matchup overall
00:14because Illinois is two-and-a-half-point favorites.
00:16And also keep in mind, folks, for novices, neutral site game,
00:20regardless of the fans that show up here,
00:23neutral site, Illinois, minus two-and-a-half, total 139-and-a-half.
00:28Oddsmakers are telling us, Paul, we're in for two really close games on Saturday.
00:33Let's start with the first one.
00:35Yeah, we're showing two-and-a-half here,
00:36and I'm not sure where that's coming from,
00:38but a lot of even one-and-a-half on the screen right now as we speak on Friday.
00:44So, you know, it is pretty much an even game.
00:47And, you know, the talk of the tournament from last weekend,
00:51UConn rallying from that 19-point first-half deficit
00:55to just stun Duke 73-72 on Braylon Mullen's desperation attempt
01:01from 35 feet in the waning seconds.
01:05In that game, it's been well-chronicled,
01:08but UConn only makes one of their first 18 three-pointers,
01:11closes by making four of their last five, including Mullen's game winner.
01:15And this one, to me, is going to come down to Terrace Reed Jr.
01:19for UConn versus Illinois' front line.
01:24And Mullen's three-pointer at the buzzer, that's going to go down as it should.
01:29It's going to be forever etched in UConn men's basketball lore.
01:34But make no mistake about it, if it wasn't for the inside work of Terrace Reed Jr.,
01:38UConn would not have been in the position to make any type of comeback against Duke.
01:43He finishes that game with big numbers against the Blue Devils.
01:50I had, if I can find it here in my notes, 26 points and nine rebounds
01:55against the Blue Devils.
01:576'11", 265-pound senior from St. Louis, just a bruiser down low.
02:03He's hit 33 of 55 field goal attempts, so 60% in the tournament.
02:08He's gone to the line 29 times, so he gets to the foul line,
02:1327 rebounds, or 54 rebounds, rather.
02:1627 of those boards coming in that first-round game against Furman.
02:20So he's just been a beast down low.
02:22But Illinois is well-equipped to defend him and perhaps neutralize him
02:27much better than most teams are.
02:29They've got the Ivacic twins, 7'2 and 7'1 from Croatia,
02:34who are obviously over 7' tall, very big guys.
02:38They've got 6'9, David Merkovich.
02:40So I think it comes down to how does Illinois, with their big front line,
02:44how do they deal with Reed?
02:46If Reed scores under 20, I think Illinois has got a really good chance to win.
02:50If Reed goes over 20, I think UConn might advance to that championship game.
02:55So that's the matchup I'm kind of going to be looking at,
02:58is Terrace Reed Jr. versus Illinois' front line.
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