Keep on Rolling
Why Illinois Basketball is Rolling to the Final Four
Yesterday morning, for some strange reason, I kept hearing one song over and over in my head.
“Roll with the Changes” by REO Speedwagon.
REO Speedwagon, who formed in Champaign, Illinois, in 1967, and who named themselves after a flatbed truck they learned about in a University of Illinois history class, wrote one of my favorite songs. It has one of the best keyboard/guitar solos ever recorded. God bless, Gary Richrath.
All I kept hearing was the chorus: “(Keep on rollin’) Ooh roll with the changes / Keep on rollin’ (Keep on rollin’, keep on rollin’).” I’m not sure why it got stuck in my head, but it probably has something to do with what I want this Illinois basketball team to do.
Keep on rolling. Don’t stop. There’s more road ahead.
Of course, if you’d ask me six weeks ago, I’d have a different story to tell. Six weeks ago, I was a bad fan.
I had made a deal with myself somewhere in that foggy stretch between the Michigan State overtime loss and the early exit at the Big Ten Tournament. I decided that nothing this Illinois team did in the regular season would count unless it was validated by the NCAA Tournament and getting to the Sweet 16.
I knew it was a terrible way to watch basketball, even as I was doing it. This team won 15 Big Ten games. They finished 13th in the country. They played through injuries and the weight of expectation and still earned a 3 seed. This year has been one of the best regular seasons I’ve watched as an Illini fan, and I’ve been watching a long time. But I’d let excitement harden into expectation, and expectation into dread, and somewhere along the way I stopped having fun watching a really good basketball team. Those overtime losses just wore me down.
First up, the NCAA Tournament game against Penn.
Illinois put up 105 points in the first round. That’s the most any Illini team has ever scored in the history of the NCAA Tournament. The previous record was 96 points, set back in 2001. They poured in 65 second-half points, which shattered the previous record for most points in a half in tournament play. That record was 53. The winning margin of 35 points is the second all-time in program history.
Thirty-seven field goals, third all-time. Fifteen three-pointers, second all-time. Forty-eight rebounds, fourth all-time.
And then there’s David Mirkovic.
He dropped 29 points, fourth most ever by an Illinois player in the tournament. Eleven field goals, third all-time. The 17 rebounds he pulled down are the most any Illini player has ever had in an NCAA tournament game. Let that sit for a second. Not James Augustine. Not Brian Cook. Not Roger Powell. Mirkovic. He owns that record now.
For one of the first times in a long time, Illinois came ready to play. They looked like one of the best teams in the country.
And belief started to creep back in.
Round two was against a pesky VCU squad. I was nervous as the game started. Getting to the Sweet 16 was what I had considered a successful season. It didn’t help that I had a house full of guests watching the game. My wife made fun of me as I twirled a FamILLy rubber wristband like it was a rosary.
I continued to be nervous until Zvonimir Ivisic blocked a dunk, ran the full length of the court, took a feed from Kylan Boswell, and dunked the ball so emphatically that I jumped from my seat.
The score was 46-32. Fifteen minutes left. The game was technically not over. But it was over, and everyone in that building knew it. What broke something loose in me wasn’t the dunk itself. It was the reaction. His brother Tomislav’s face. His teammates on the bench. The pure joy of it.
Man, I needed that.
The Illini handled VCU the way good teams handle opponents they’re better than. The defense was relentless. VCU shot 35 percent and scored their worst offensive total of the season. Brad Underwood earned his 300th career Division I win. And next up was No. 2 seed Houston in the Sweet 16.
I told myself I was going to enjoy every second of it.
The game against Houston was advertised as a Final Four-caliber matchup. It delivered.
The first half was a lesson in defensive stops. Both teams combined for 46 points, the lowest-scoring opening half of any tournament game in 2026. Illinois was holding Houston to almost nothing, and Houston’s defense, which came in ranked second in the country, was doing the same to the Illini. Andrej Stojakovic sparked two separate runs off the bench and gave Illinois a 21-14 lead at one point, but Houston ended the half on a 6-0 burst, with Kingston Flemings drilling a three at the buzzer. Illinois led 24-22 at the break.
The second half started, and Illinois went on a blistering 17-0 run over about seven minutes. Jake Davis scored five points during the stretch. Mirkovic and Ben Humrichous capped it with back-to-back threes. When Houston finally ended the drought, almost seven minutes had passed since they’d scored. The lead was 44-26 with 12 minutes left. That run, by the way, was the longest any Houston team had allowed in eight seasons. The Cougars never got the game closer than seven points after that.
Wagler had 13 points and 12 rebounds, a career-high on the boards and his first double-double of the season. Mirkovic added 14 and 10. Wagler and Mirkovic are the first pair of freshman teammates to each have a double-double in the same NCAA tournament game since freshmen became eligible in the 1972-1973 season. Stojakovic finished with 13. Tomislav Ivisic chipped in nine points, three rebounds, three assists, and had a dagger three.
Final score: Illinois 65, Houston 55.
Houston shot 34 percent from the floor. They got two free throw attempts the entire game, a number so small it’s almost hard to believe. Illinois owned the glass 43-34. On a night when the Illini didn’t shoot it particularly well themselves, they completely dictated how the game was played.
This was the best win of the Brad Underwood era. Arguably the best NCAA Tournament win since the 2005 Arizona comeback. Underwood’s nine tournament wins at Illinois now tie him with Bruce Weber and Harry Combes, three behind the program record held by Lou Henson. When people were questioning whether Underwood could lead a deep March run, Thursday night was the answer.
Up next is Iowa, who shocked No. 1 seed Florida and then No. 4 seed Nebraska in the other South Regional semifinal. Ben McCollum and the Hawkeyes have surprised everyone. Illinois beat them 75-69 in Iowa City back in January, building an 18-point lead before Iowa made it close late. Expect more of the same. Illinois has the size, the depth, and the defense to handle this matchup.
The Flying Illini, who made the Final Four in 1989, became mythic partly because of what they did in March. The Dee-Deron-Luther team from 2005 almost went all the way. Teams get remembered for how they finish. Keep winning. That’s all that separates this roster from being talked about in the same breath as those teams forever.
This team is more talented, top to bottom, than any Illini squad since 2005. Wagler is a consensus freshman All-American and the best freshman player ever at Illinois. Mirkovic is a monster. Stojakovic gives them a reliable third option. Ivisic is a 7-footer who has hit 102 three-pointers over the past two seasons, which is the most in the nation at that height. Hometown hero Boswell is the floor general. They have size and shooting, and now they defend at a high level. They are complete.
Against Houston, in a hostile building, against one of the best defensive teams in the country, they found a way to win. Before the game started, I firmly believed the winner was going to the Final Four. I said it out loud the moment the final buzzer sounded.
The winner was Illinois.
They’ve got Iowa later today. I’ve watched this team work through injuries, too many overtime heartbreaks, and a regular season full of highs and lows. I watched them come into the postseason and blow up record books against Penn, then turn around and suffocate one of the best defensive teams in America. They are playing their best basketball right now.
The Final Four is in Indianapolis. I think this team will find a way to be one of the last teams dancing.
“Roll with the Changes” is about accepting what’s in front of you and moving with it rather than against it. It’s the rare arena rock song that doubles as decent life advice. I spent six weeks fighting this team’s season in my head, demanding outcomes instead of watching basketball. That’s over now. I’m rolling with it.
Watching them these last two weeks, something has shifted. My bad-fan anxiety is gone. What’s left is this: I love this team. I love watching them play. And I think they’re about to do something this program hasn’t done in 21 years.
Be seeing you.
Harry Potter and Philosopher’s Stone Trailer
HBO dropped the first teaser trailer for its Harry Potter series, and the surprise at the end is that the show is coming on Christmas Day, not sometime in 2027 as everyone had assumed.
The show stars Dominic McLaughlin as Harry, with John Lithgow as Dumbledore, Paapa Essiedu as Snape, and Nick Frost as Hagrid.
The plan is one book per season, seven seasons total, using Rowling's original title for the first book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, rather than the American title that the movies went with. I assume each season will be renamed as if this series is really season long adaptations of each book.
Lithgow as Dumbledore feels weird. Additionally, the controversy around Essiedu's casting and Rowling's involvement as executive producer isn't going away.
I still haven’t decided if I’m going to watch this.
Cardinals Opening Day
The Cardinals opened the 2026 season at Busch Stadium on Thursday and got a win. That was nice.
The roster going into this season is mostly youth-focused, with new President of Baseball Operations Chaim Bloom starting his first full year running the front office and top prospect JJ Wetherholt breaking camp with the big club. Nice home run, kid.
This is a rebuild year dressed up in Cardinal red. I don’t say that as a criticism. Sometimes a rebuild is the honest and correct thing to do, and the fans who show up over the course of 162 games deserve to know what they’re rooting for: a future that isn’t here yet, and a present that might surprise you.
Grandma's Vanilla Creme Mini Sandwich Cookies
I want to be clear that I’m talking about the specific Grandma’s brand mini vanilla creme sandwich cookies that come in the little blue bag, typically found near the checkout lane or in a vending machine, and that I am not embarrassed about any of this.
There is something scientifically correct about the ratio of cookie to filling in that product. It is not too sweet. It is not too dry. The miniature scale means you eat six before you’ve registered that you’ve started. The vanilla creme is not trying to be fancy. It has one job and it does that job with the confidence of something that has been around since before you were born.
I could write about a more respectable snack. I chose not to.
Introverse Review
I sent my review of Basement Alchemy and the new album Introverse to Shai Pelled (who is basically Basement Alchemy) and he sent a nice note back about how much he loved it and that he’ll share it with his audience.
It made my afternoon.
