Tim Jankovich’s Redbirds fell off a cliff last year following the departure of stars Osiris Eldridge, Dinma Odiakosa and others, falling from 22-11 to 12-19. The drop was even more galling considering they’d won 25 and 24 games the previous two years, respectively. Beyond the obvious reasons for the drop — the departure of their top players — their offense was the culprit. Specifically, their inability to score. They scored 490 fewer points, dished out almost 100 fewer assists, and scored an average of eight less points a game. Head coach Tim Jankovich talked with us at MVC media day about last year’s struggles, and how he hopes to improve upon them this year.
“I knew going into last year we were not going to be as strong as we had been the previous three years. At the same time, I didn’t know we would struggle to score as much as we did. That was our downfall. That was the story of last season. It was pretty cut and dry.”
To help improve their offense, Jankovich brought in five new guards, and leaned heavily on Jackie Carmichael to improve over the summer. The 6’9″ junior forward averaged 9.8 points and 4.1 rebounds last year, and it’s Jankovich’s hope that he can improve both statistics significantly.
“He’s had the best offseason, the best summer, he’s had since he’s been here. I see a guy who is more highly motivated than he has ever been. He’s going to be a big key to our season. We’re going to be counting on him to really up his numbers, and I think he’s really capable of it.”
Another returnee is John Wilkins, a 6’9″ player whose father, Jeff, scored 1,329 points from 1974-77 for the Redbirds (17th in school history) and went on to play for Utah and San Antonio in the NBA. John started 17 games a year ago as a sophomore, and got more comfortable as the season went on, making at least one three-pointer in each of the final six games. He led the Redbirds in both three-pointers made (33) and three-point field goal percentage (37.1%). “John has improved his strength a great deal,” Jankovich told WBR at media day. “We’re confident he will be much more productive from an offensive standpoint.”
6’7″ forward Jon Ekey returns for his sophomore season after setting the Illinois State school record for blocked shots by a freshman with 52 last year. He averaged 4.6 points and 4.2 rebounds, all while playing out of position as Jankovich told us.
“I played him at a position (small forward) that he was not totally comfortable with. I think he can eventually become comfortable there. He did a great job as a freshman, and I expect bigger things from him.”
Starting point guard Anthony Cousin also returns, a 5’11” junior who averaged 6.8 points, 2 assists and 1.4 rebounds a game in his first year in Normal. Unfortunately, he also turned it over a ton.
“He had some very good games. But he was not always consistent. He worked as hard as anyone in our league. Everything starts with point guards and they are the pulse of the team; if your point guard is struggling within the game, it’s hard for everyone else to play well, and that was part of our offensive struggle a year ago.”
Nic Moore, a three-star recruit who was the runner-up for Mr. Basketball in Indiana, will help solidify the point guard position. And 6’4″ JuCo guard Tyler Brown will help shoulder some of the scoring load — the two-time JuCo All-American ranked 13th in the NJCAA in scoring a year ago when he averaged 21.2 points a game.
With all of their newcomers, and how far they have to go to get back to being competitive in the Valley, how’s practice been going so far?
“We are still in the ‘Practice is pretty fun’ stage, because we’re only a week or so in, so it’s going very well — which it usually does this time of year.
About half of the team is brand new to college basketball, and the other half is returning. Thankfully, like many of the teams, we had a foreign trip which helped us greatly. I can’t imagine where we would be today had we not done that because we’re still not where we need to be. But thankfully we had that opportunity.”
Their trip to Montreal and Ottawa, Canada was hugely beneficial, Jankovich told us.
“We’re really thankful that we did not use that trip, because you only get one every four years. We were just thankful that it was available to us. We had a great trip. We took the philosophy to play every single guy, every single game. We basically mapped out everybody’s minutes before the game even started. It was tremendous for us.”
It’s a steep rebuilding curve for the Redbirds, made tougher by the overall improvement in the Valley over the last couple of years, and an influx of good young talent.
“Hopefully we’ve got some of the good young guys, because we’ve got a bunch of young guys. This league is well-known and well-thought of for older players that have developed into outstanding players and outstanding teams. That’s kind of what we’re famous for.
Lately, it seems to me there are more and more impact young players — freshmen, first year guys — and I think that speaks volumes for the direction of the league and the recruiting efforts by the coaches in the league. Obviously that can only help us. The higher the talent, the better the teams, the more exposure, and on and on. I’ve always been impressed with the older teams, the older players for years but I’m seeing some guys do some amazing things at a very young age now.”
Despite winning 25, 24 and 21 games in three years at or near the top of the Valley, Illinois State earned not one NCAA Tournament bid to show for their success. When asked about that, and the general trend of fewer and fewer bids going to mid-major teams, Jankovich didn’t hold back.
“The truth of the at-large bids is that on one side is great talent and great teams. The better you are, the better chance you have. Everyone knows that. And of course, the better our teams get, the more opportunities in theory that we’ll get.
But the other side never gets talked about is opportunity. Two years ago, I think it was, there were four at-large bids if I’m not mistaken given to non-BCS schools. Four in the entire country, and that’s 270 schools. Last year I think it was eight and the year before that there were six. And that rarely gets talked about.
It’s also something that none of us as coaches can ever control — how many is in the pool of opportunity. Several years ago it was as high as 12, and our league was a benefactor of that, had some teams really advance in the NCAA Tournament. Since that time for whatever reason, and I’m not smart enough to know why, that number has gone down from 12 clear down to four, and so that’s the other side of that.
All we can do as coaches is try to recruit the best talent — the more good young players we have in this league that become great older players, maybe the better chance we have. But at the same time, it’s two sides to the coin, and we need the opportunity as well.”
After winning just 12 games a year ago, the Redbirds won’t be anywhere near the discussion for the NCAA or NIT tournaments come March. But if they can get to 16 or 17 wins, a CBI or CIT bid might be in the offing. That would be a nice springboard for 2012-13 when they’ll return every single player, and hope to be a veteran team poised to contend.