New Coach Drives Illini Resurgence

Coach Bill Self heard enough tales of jealousy and pouting to see through the hype about his new team. The Illini were talented but struggling to get along.

If their record so far this season is any indication, the players must be the best of friends now.

The sixth-ranked Illini won 16 of their first 21 games, living up to their preseason billing with a coach who showed up at his first workouts in combat fatigues and face paint.

Forward Lucas Johnson said much of the team’s improvement comes from players simply growing up.

“A lot of that had to do with maturity,” he said. “We have a lot more guys on this team who’ve been through wars together. That’s been a real calming factor for our team, and the coaches are pushing that.”

Self, the former coach at Tulsa, inherited from Lon Kruger a team that won 22 games last season. The Illini finished strong, winning 10 of their last 13 games, but fizzled in a second-round NCAA tournament loss to Florida.

While Illinois was picked to come back as a Top 10 team this season, people closer to the program wondered if the new coach could calm the sometimes volatile chemistry.

“The thought I had going in was we were going to be good, but we had to become tougher,” Self said. “That’s not just about beating a guy to a loose ball. That is one form of it, but it’s a lot of other things.”

The “other things” were more mental than physical. So along with the challenge of installing a new offense and defense, Self played counselor.

Beginning the June morning he walked into a room full of players stung by Kruger’s abrupt departure for the Atlanta Hawks, he preached togetherness.

Self told them they could win the national championship this season, but only if they set aside individual interests.

“Give the players the majority of the credit on that,” he said. “I hope it’s a few things we’ve done, but I also think the players are a year older.”

Frank Williams is no longer the wide-eyed freshman who, by his own admission, made plays at point guard better suited for a circus sideshow. Freshman Brian Cook and junior college transfer Marcus Griffin had the size and skills, but needed a year to adapt.

“You’re putting a lot of people in situations they hadn’t been in before and expecting them to perform,” forward Sergio McClain said. “We were really young.”

Williams, Griffin and Cook are now the team’s top three scorers. And Johnson and McClain said Self’s aggressive offense and grinding defense match the personnel. Almost as important, however, players said Self’s scheme is more fun.

Instead of running plays to isolate shooter Cory Bradford, the Illini get open shots with a flurry of inside-out passes that make almost everyone a threat.

“Which one of those guys are you not going to guard?” asked Ohio State coach Jim O’Brien after big men Damir Krupalija and Cook hit 3-pointers to finish off the Buckeyes earlier this year.

Offseason workouts began with a summer bootcamp, where Self showed up in his fatigues. That conditioning and their depth combine to allow Illinois to constantly apply pressure on defense. They collapse when anyone gets a pass inside and they force foes into more outside shots than most coaches like.

Opponents are shooting just 35 percent against Illinois -- tops in the Big Ten and among the nation’s best. The Illini get another chance to show off that defense on Tuesday against defending national champion Michigan State.

“I thought it would take longer to get guys to buy in and do the things we’re trying to do,” Self said. “I’m real pleased, but not satisfied.”

It’s that unwillingness to be satisfied that Self wants to see in the Illini.

Tulsa had that last year. Self’s team went 32-5 and were in almost every loss until the buzzer sounded. In the school’s first-ever NCAA regional final, the Golden Hurricane challenged North Carolina until the last four seconds before falling 59-55.

“We may not have been the best team but those guys at Tulsa really believed they had a shot,” Self said.

No sooner had the team plane landed in Tulsa than the suitors came calling. Each time a high-profile job opened, Self’s name was on the short list.

Self and his wife, Cindy, were happy. But even a public proclamation he was staying put did not silence the buzz about his future.

“We told ourselves we were going to stay,” he said. “But of all the jobs that came open, there wasn’t one like Illinois.”

In a whirlwind courtship, Self was handed the keys to a Big Ten program he felt could be tuning up for something big instead of waiting to be rebuilt.

“Usually, you get a job because a guy got fired,” he said.

Self got his first assistant’s job by casually asking Kansas’ Larry Brown for help. Brown said, “You’re hired,” and the Jayhawks went to the Final Four.

After seven years at his alma mater, Oklahoma State, Self got his first head coaching jobs at nearby Oral Roberts and Tulsa, where his years of Oklahoma connections helped him land recruits.

Both schools gave Self the tools to win, but the work was hard. So Self understands the good fortune of the head start Kruger left him at Illinois.