1971–72 Illinois Fighting Illini men's basketball team

1971–72 Illinois Fighting Illini men's basketball

Gator Bowl Tournament, Champions
Conference	Big Ten Conference
Ranking
Coaches	No. Not ranked
AP	No. Not ranked
1971–72 record	14–10 (5–9 Big Ten)
Head coach	Harv Schmidt
Assistant coach	Dick Campbell
Assistant coach	Jim Wright
MVP	Nick Weatherspoon
Captain	Jim Krelle
Home arena	Assembly Hall

1971–72 Big Ten Conference men's basketball standings
	Conf				Overall
Team	W		L	PCT	W		L	PCT
#11 Minnesota	11	–	3	.786	17	–	6	.739
#19 Ohio State	10	–	4	.714	18	–	6	.750
#17 Indiana	9	–	5	.643	17	–	8	.680
Michigan	9	–	5	.643	14	–	10	.583
Michigan State	6	–	8	.429	13	–	11	.542
Wisconsin	6	–	8	.429	13	–	11	.542
Purdue	6	–	8	.429	12	–	12	.500
Illinois	5	–	9	.357	14	–	10	.583
Iowa	5	–	9	.357	11	–	13	.458
Northwestern	3	–	11	.214	5	–	18	.217

Rankings from AP Poll

The 1971–72 Illinois Fighting Illini men's basketball team represented the University of Illinois.

Regular season

The 1971-72 Fighting Illini men's basketball season, led by head coach Harv Schmidt, experienced the a tale of two years, 1971 and 1972. The Fighting Illini opened the season December 1, 1971, with a win over Butler and proceeded to win 7 of their next 8 games, finishing 1971 with an 8-1 record. That streak would continue into January 1972 for one more game, the opening game of the Big Ten season. After beating Northwestern the Fighting Illini would go on to drop 9 of their next 14 games, finishing the season with a 14-10 record, tied for 8th place in the conference.

The brightest spot of the season would shine upon junior forward Nick Weatherspoon. Weatherspoon would return from a terrific sophomore campaign where he scored 381 points, averaging 16.5 points per game and collected 246 rebounds. During this season, 1971–72, he would score 500 total points, averaging 20.8 points and pull down 262 rebounds.

The 1971-72 team's starting lineup included Weatherspoon and Nick Conner at the forward spots, Jim Krelle and Garvin Roberson as guards and Bill Morris at center.

Team

No.	Player	Hometown	High School	Class	Position
10	Garvin Roberson	Elkhart, Indiana	Elkhart Central High School	So.	Guard
12	Nick Weatherspoon	Canton, Ohio	McKinley High School	Jr.	Forward
14	C.J. Schroeder	Davenport, Iowa	Davenport West High School	So.	Guard
21	Larry Cohen	Wilmette, Illinois	New Trier East High School	Jr.	Guard
25	Jim Krelle	Aurora, Illinois	Aurora West High School	Sr.	Guard
30	Mike Wente	Effingham, Illinois	St. Anthony High School	So.	Forward
34	Greg Wilson	Sebring, Ohio	McKinley High School	So.	Guard
35	Bill Morris	St. Louis, Missouri	Beaumont High School	So.	Center
40	John McBride	Orland Park, Illinois	Carl Sandburg High School	Jr.	Guard/Forward
42	Jim Rucks	Waukegan, Illinois	Waukegan High School	Jr.	Forward
43	Kim Jolley	Indianola, Illinois	Jamaica High School	So.	Forward
44	Jed Foster	Fairfield, Illinois	Fairfield High School	Jr.	Forward
45	Nick Conner	Columbus, Ohio	East High School	Jr.	Forward/Center
54	Jim DeDecker	Moline, Illinois	Alleman High School	Jr.	Center

Head Coach Harv Schmidt (5th year at Illinois) ^[1]

Schedule

Source^[2]

Date time, TV	Opponent	Result	Record	Site (attendance) city, state
12/1/1971* no, no	vs.Butler	W 73-71	1 - 0	Assembly Hall (12,959) Champaign, IL
12/4/1971* no, no	@ #20 Oklahoma	W 70-65	2 - 0	McCasland Field House (8,326) Norman, OK
12/7/1971* no, no	vs. South Dakota	W 96-56	3 - 0	Assembly Hall (12,206) Champaign, IL
12/10/1971* no, no	@ Tulane	W 79-68	4 - 0	Devlin Fieldhouse (3,250) New Orleans, LA
12/11/1971* no, no	@ Loyola (New Orleans)	W 94-74	5 - 0	Devlin Fieldhouse (1,345) New Orleans, LA
12/16/1971* no, no	vs. Georgia	W 84-78	6 - 0	Assembly Hall (12,447) Champaign, IL
12/23/1971* no, no	@ Vanderbilt	L 92-95	6 - 1	Memorial Gymnasium (14,000) Nashville, TN
12/28/1971* no, no	vs. North Carolina State Gator Bowl Tournament	W 74-72	7 - 1	Jacksonville Coliseum (6,506) Jacksonville, FL
12/29/1971* no, no	vs. Florida Gator Bowl Tournament	W 76-75	8 - 1	Jacksonville Coliseum (8,248) Jacksonville, FL
1/8/1972 no, no	@ Northwestern	W 67-63	9 - 1 ( 1 - 0 )	Welsh-Ryan Arena (5,885) Evanston, IL
1/11/1972 no, no	vs. Michigan	L 76-75	9 - 2 ( 1 - 1 )	Assembly Hall (14,836) Champaign, IL
1/15/1972 no, no	vs. Purdue	L 74-85	9 - 3 ( 1 - 2 )	Assembly Hall (16,017) Champaign, IL
1/28/1972* no, no	vs. Notre Dame	W 81-59	10 - 3	Chicago Stadium (11,255) Chicago, IL
2/5/1972 no, no	vs. Northwestern	W 68-59	11 - 3 ( 2 - 2 )	Assembly Hall (13,628) Champaign, IL
2/8/1972 no, no	@ Michigan State	L 79-89	11 - 4 ( 2 - 3 )	Jenison Fieldhouse (6,132) East Lansing, MI
2/12/1972 no, no	@ Michigan	L 83-105	11 - 5 ( 2 - 4 )	Crisler Center (12,562) Ann Arbor, MI
2/15/1972 no, no	@ Iowa	L 84-87	11 - 6 ( 2 - 5 )	Iowa Field House (12,559) Iowa City, IA
2/17/1973 no, no	vs. #8 Ohio State	W 64-62	12 - 6 ( 3 - 5 )	Assembly Hall (15,236) Champaign, IL
2/22/1972 no, no	vs. Indiana	L 71-90	12 - 7 ( 3 - 6 )	Assembly Hall (14,083) Champaign, IL
2/26/1972 no, no	vs. Wisconsin	W 91-86	13 - 7 ( 4 - 6 )	Assembly Hall (14,006) Champaign, IL
2/29/1972 no, no	@ #14 Ohio State	L 70-103	13 - 8 ( 4 - 7 )	St. John Arena (13,489) Columbus, OH
3/4/1972 no, no	@ Minnesota	L 62-91	13 - 9 ( 4 - 8 )	Williams Arena (14,666) Minneapolis, MN
3/7/1972 no, no	vs. Iowa	W 91-84	14 - 9 ( 5 - 8 )	Assembly Hall (11,554) Champaign, IL
3/11/1972 no, no	@ Wisconsin	L 84-97	14 - 10 ( 5 - 9 )	Wisconsin Field House (7,242) Madison, WI
*Non-conference game. ^#Rankings from AP Poll. (#) Tournament seedings in parentheses. All times are in Central Time.

Player stats

Player	Games Played	Field Goals	Free Throws	Rebounds	Points
Nick Weatherspoon^[3]	24	200	100	262	500
Bill Morris^[3]	21	113	93	197	319
Jim Krelle^[3]	23	104	70	78	278
Nick Conner^[3]	24	101	51	204	253
Larry Cohen^[3]	21	42	39	28	123
Garvin Roberson^[3]	24	39	42	51	120
Jed Foster^[3]	19	38	42	67	118
C.J. Schroeder^[3]	21	23	30	33	76

Awards and honors

Nick Weatherspoon
- Team Most Valuable Player ^[4]

Team players drafted into the NBA

No Players Drafted^[5]

References

↑ "All-Time Illini Rosters". Fightingillini.com. Archived from the original on 2010-04-22. Retrieved 2013-12-17.
↑ University of Illinois Fighting Illini Statistics Summary for 1971-72, FightingIllini.com
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "pg. 117" (PDF). Retrieved 2013-12-17.
↑ "List of MVPs" (PDF). Retrieved 2013-12-17.
↑ "1973 NBA Draft on". Databasebasketball.com. Archived from the original on 2014-06-30. Retrieved 2013-12-17.

Illinois Fighting Illini men's basketball
Venues	Kenney Gym (1906–1925) Huff Hall (1926–1963) State Farm Center (1963–present) Prairie Capital Convention Center (2015)
Rivalries	Indiana Missouri
Culture & lore	Whiz Kids Flyin' Illini Orange Krush Fighting Illini Sports Network Oskee Wow-Wow Illinois Loyalty Chief Illiniwek
People	Head coaches NBA draftees Consensus All-Americans
Seasons	1905–06 1906–07 1907–08 1908–09 1909–10 1910–11 1911–12 1912–13 1913–14 1914–15 1915–16 1916–17 1917–18 1918–19 1919–20 1920–21 1921–22 1922–23 1923–24 1924–25 1925–26 1926–27 1927–28 1928–29 1929–30 1930–31 1931–32 1932–33 1933–34 1934–35 1935–36 1936–37 1937–38 1938–39 1939–40 1940–41 1941–42 1942–43 1943–44 1944–45 1945–46 1946–47 1947–48 1948–49 1949–50 1950–51 1951–52 1952–53 1953–54 1954–55 1955–56 1956–57 1957–58 1958–59 1959–60 1960–61 1961–62 1962–63 1963–64 1964–65 1965–66 1966–67 1967–68 1968–69 1969–70 1970–71 1971–72 1972–73 1973–74 1974–75 1975–76 1976–77 1977–78 1978–79 1979–80 1980–81 1981–82 1982–83 1983–84 1984–85 1985–86 1986–87 1987–88 1988–89 1989–90 1990–91 1991–92 1992–93 1993–94 1994–95 1995–96 1996–97 1997–98 1998–99 1999–00 2000–01 2001–02 2002–03 2003–04 2004–05 2005–06 2006–07 2007–08 2008–09 2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2012–13 2013–14 2014–15 2015–16 2016–17 2017–18
Helms and Premo-Porretta national championships in bold; NCAA Final Four appearances in italics

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