Obviously we know who Nebraska is and have played them. Unsuccessfully. For today's game, Mast and Frager were still described as "maybes" by Hoiberg on Friday. Both had participated in a practice, but it does sound like Mast lost some serious weight being sick. So if those guys do play, a normal opposing fan would be expecting a limited performance from them. An opposing Illini fan will be expecting them both to have career games. We shall see.

Nebraska is currently 5 in the Net, having somehow moved up and over us through losing to Michigan while we beat Washington (yay math). We've obviously seen them...they defend their assess off, are very physical, and have role players that know their roles very well.

Let's do a quick analysis of the first time we played them...box score here.

Defensively, this game was our last of the two "first two" Big Ten games, and also was before a 9 day layoff where the staff took those days to simplify/grind on defensive principals. The Nebraska game hammered home the need for that, and since then, our defense has looked significantly better. If you'll remember, the next game was Mizzou, and we held them to 48 points. That game also started our current 10 win streak. So HOPEFULLY Nebraska sees a different version of Illinois that they saw back in mid-December. And hopefully the refs allow us to be in the game without big foul issues (hopefully they will, because if they get ticky tacky on us, Nebraska pretty much fouls on every possession, so there will be opportunity for makeup calls).

Offensively that day, Kylan, Keaton, and Andre led the way. Everybody else was somewhat of an afterthought. To win today, Andre HAS to step up and have a game, and we'll need the bigs to capitalize on what should be a diminished Mast.

Go get em', Illini. Revenge.