Illinois rallies to beat Ohio State 77-74 in Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals

MINNEAPOLIS — You know what Illinois’ men’s basketball team needs? A long, dramatic, glorious postseason run.

Who doesn’t, right?

But it has been awhile for the Illini since a postseason felt damn good. Maybe a 77-74 victory against stubborn Ohio State in the Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals Friday was the start of a memorable March.

The fans have been starving for one of those since 2005.

In 2021, the Illini won the Big Ten Tournament with a stellar, star-driven team led by Ayo Dosunmu and Kofi Cockburn. But that team — a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament — made it only as far as the Round of 32 against Loyola.

The next two seasons, Illinois went one-and-done in the Big Ten’s postseason event and failed again to get past the opening weekend of the Big Dance, which still hasn’t happened in Illini world since, again, 2005.

Cutting down some nets at the Target Center would be one way to pump Illini Nation full of mojo. Step 1 was clawing back to beat the 10th-seeded Buckeyes (20-13), who led by double digits midway through the second half. From there, the second-seeded Illini (24-8) had to dig deep for made shots, clutch offensive rebounds and a few utterly necessary defensive stops against a desperate opponent that came in playing very well.

‘‘It was a postseason game,’’ coach Brad Underwood said. ‘‘It was everything that you’ve got to fight through all in one.’’

Conference tournaments don’t necessarily mean the same amount to all the teams in them. Witness Kansas coach Bill Self resting banged-up stars Hunter Dickinson and Kevin McCullar for the Big 12 Tournament, where the disappointing Jayhawks mailed it in. The Big Ten’s big bopper, Purdue, has nothing to gain here; the Boilermakers are locked into a No. 1 NCAA seed, almost certainly in the Midwest Region. Yet there were the team’s best two players — Zach Edey and Braden Smith — each
going to the floor and clutching a wounded leg part in a meaningless quarterfinal victory against Michigan State.

When Smith, an all-league point guard, hobbled up the tunnel with an apparent non-contact injury — he would return, thank goodness — it made one wonder why Boilers coach Matt Painter wasn’t emptying his bench and letting some other team empty its tank before the biggest part of March madness begins.

Then there was Northwestern, a 70-61 loser against Wisconsin. The Wildcats (21-11) don’t have a résumé that couldn’t stand to be improved, but they’re also without starting guard Ty Berry for the rest of the season and were without injured starting center Matthew Nicholson for this tournament — and possibly longer — and didn’t have that much depth to begin with. As enjoyable to watch as the duel between the Badgers’ AJ Storr (30 points) and Boo Buie (29 points) was, Northwestern’s key starters play more minutes than any other group in the country. And no one outside of Edey carries a heavier load on his shoulders than Buie, who shot 7-for-11 from three while his teammates combined for an abysmal 1-for-12.

Yes, it was the second consecutive year Northwestern earned a double-bye in the tournament, only to be bounced by a lower seed in its first game. Yes, Northwestern still has been as far as the semifinals only once, in 2017. Yes, its Big Ten Tournament record is an incredibly bad 10-27. But better than confronting all that this year was bowing out and resting up for what’s ahead.

‘‘In hindsight, it’s not the worst thing,’’ coach Chris Collins said. ‘‘The worst thing would probably be to play three games and lose in the championship because you get wiped out and then you’ve got to fly home and figure out who you’re playing [next]. That being said, as a competitor, you don’t view it that way.’’

Ohio State needed to keep winning to have a chance to get into the Big Dance, and interim coach Jake Diebler needed to keep winning to have an honest chance to be the full-time successor to fired Chris Holtmann, now at DePaul. The Buckeyes were going to leave every ounce of determination on the floor, and they did.

But the Illini roared to life when they needed to and did it on a night when what they could count on and what they couldn’t was unusual.

Terrence Shannon Jr. finished with 28 points and closed strong, despite carrying four fouls through much of the second half. After coming back into the game with 6:27 to go, he scored nine points, seven of them on free throws, by putting his head down and driving to the rim with a fury few players can match.

But fellow All-Big Ten player Marcus Domask had an awful shooting night, going 3-for-16, and old-timer Coleman Hawkins scored just seven points. Enter reserve big man Dain Dainja — from the Twin Cities suburbs — who delivered perhaps the best game of his career, scoring 18 points and grabbing eight rebounds. Five buckets, each one bigger than the last, came after the Illini had fallen behind by 10 with 11 minutes to go.

‘‘I’ve got both of my parents here, [which] means a lot to me, and then all my friends who supported me from Day 1,’’ Dainja said. ‘‘So it’s just a good feeling. . . .

‘‘It was just refusing to lose.’’

That’s something the Illini — who won the Big Ten Tournament as a No. 2 seed in 2003 and 2021 — will try to build on. Next up is a semifinal date with No. 3 seed Nebraska at about 2:30 p.m. Saturday.

‘‘I don’t doubt this team’s toughness and their grit,’’ Underwood said.

It would be nice to see it in action for a while.