Saturday, February 2, 2019, 9:00 p.m.
Redbird Arena, Normal, Illinois

Once again, the Illinois State Redbirds have started off the season as one of the top-rated teams in preseason polls only to struggle before finding their stride. The Redbirds looked like they had trouble maintaining their interest at times during the non-con season, with losses to UIC, Belmont, Ole Miss (at home), San Diego State, and Georgia. They struggled against Boise State, Cleveland State, and Chicago State. And then when the bell rang for the MVC race, they were shocked on a last-second half-court shot at Valpo.

But since the Valpo shocker, the Redbirds have gone 6-2, with the two losses at Loyola and at Bradley. Dan Mueller’s crew is 9-2 at home on the year, and 20-5 at home over the past two seasons. More importantly, some of the players who struggled in the early going are starting to find their niche in ISU’s rotations.

In Loyola’s 67-64 win over Illinois State on Jan. 12 at Gentile Arena, Malik Yarbrough scored a team-high 19 points, but the Ramblers held MVC preseason first-teamer Phil Fayne to only 7 points and 5 rebounds. The player who made the game so close was senior guard Keyshawn Evans, who scored a season-high 16 points-- nearly triple his season average up to that point. Beginning with that breakout game, Evans has averaged 12.3 points per game over the last six contests. Fayne has averaged 17.2 points and 6.2 boards since the Loyola game, including 48 points in the last two games.

Matt Chastain and Zach Copeland have also played well since the Loyola game. Chastain has had some super-athletic highlights on defense, and hit four threes in a win at Evansville. Copeland had 19 points last time out in a win at Drake. Guard Josh Jefferson began the season in the starting lineup, dropped to the bench near the start of conference play, and hasn’t appeared in a game since Jan. 15.

With Loyola’s win over ISU on Jan. 12, the Ramblers erased the memory of an ugly loss at Evansville and looked to take control of the conference race. Two solid wins followed before a mystifying, smoking-hole, worst in 20 years, disaster of a loss at Missouri State. Compared to last season Loyola is shooting about the same from the field (50%), but Loyola’s advantage in assists, turnovers, and three-point shooting have lagged well behind last year.

Saturday night’s game will pose another yet another challenge for the Ramblers. It seems like every game this season has been a battle for first place in the conference. The Ramblers are 2-2 so far this year in road MVC games.

Loyola game notes: https://loyolaramblers.com/documents/20 ... df?id=8321

Illinois State game notes: https://goredbirds.com/documents/2019/2 ... _notes.pdf

TV/Streaming video: ESPN2 http://www.espn.com/watch/_/id/3469684/ ... nois-state

Live stats: http://stats.statbroadcast.com/broadcast/?id=237321

Vegas odds: Illinois State by 1

What an opportunity we have over the next two games. We have the chance to not only take a 2 game lead but also seal the tiebreaker against the two teams behind us.

Tomorrow's game will no doubt be a tough one. I expect the place to be rocking, national TV, etc. Birds have been playing pretty well in conference play (besides their loss to Bradley). This would be a monster win.

Wow. Looking at the Illinois State board. They really seem fired up for us to be coming to town.

I recently found out from their Loyola thread that they charge students to get into the games. I didn’t know that. Are they the only ones in the conference?

The reporter for the Pentagraph tweeted at 7 pm that Loyola wasn’t even at the arena yet. Why would we not be there 2 hours to game time???????

They had Yarbrough on Krutwig early with the double team ready to go when they passed to him. Interesting. Fayne guarding Uguak?

Lots of crazy matchups early.

Hugely intense game early. It looks like this rivalry is really shaping up.

Does it seem like teams we play always hit high difficulty threes?

Really miss Williamson here. He'd be huge on Yarb. We just dont really have a guy that can match up on him (there really aren't many guys in the MVC that can).

Yes, because we get them late in the shot clock when they have to hoist them up. Even in desperation they're probably going to hit 25% of them.

Basically just 6 guys playing.. lots of minutes...