NIT: Illinois Struggling At Boston In First Half

Everyone talks about how difficult it can be to fill out their brackets for the NCAA Tournament. There's usually plenty of broken brackets thanks to over thinking it and going out of your way to predict the upsets. Well when everything is said and done, the NCAA Tournament is child's play compared to filling out a NIT bracket, something me and my best friends have done since the tail end of high school.

The reality is you just never know. Most of the strong teams in the NIT are usually NCAA bubble teams that were plagued with inconsistency. This becomes even more problematic when you realize that most of the major conference teams are almost impossible to tell if they're going to actually try or if they'll just go out and wing it. St. John's is a perfect example, a power conference team that didn't take the NIT serious and got killed by Robert Morris.

Illinois started off the first half in "couldn't care" mood, allowing the Terriers to go on an early 18-2 run. Oh, and Illinois also went over seven minutes with only one made field goal. The Illini quickly fell behind by 17 points, trailing Boston 13-30. The Illini responded with an 8-0 run to cut it down to 9 and then both teams split the rest of the way out, with Boston taking a 33-24 lead at the break.

Rayvonte Rice has anchored the Illini, leading the team with 8 points and 6 rebounds. Illinois is shooting better from the field than Boston, but has turned it over eight times already.

It should be noted that Boston University scored 33 points in the first half. They scored 36 points total in their last game versus American.