Georgetown Tops Illini Men 88-80
Georgetown coach Patrick Ewing watches Illinois freshman Ayo Dosunmu lainch a three-pointer Tuesday night in Champaign. Rob McColley/for Illinois Public Media
Patrick Ewing's Georgetown Hoyas outlasted the Illini men in a frenetic basketball game last night at State Farm Center. The final score was 88-80.
The Hoyas' size advantage proved the difference as Georgetown out-rebounded the hosts by a 39-26 margin, and blocked six Illini shots.
Coach Brad Underwood said defensive execution suffered without Trent Frazier, who banged heads with teammate Giorgi Bezhanishvili in Monday's practice, and sat out Tuesday under concussion protocol.
"Trent's taken five charges in our exhibition (game) and in our first (regular season) game because he's a great help side defender," Underwood said. "We missed that, and Trent's very vocal on the court."
Ayo Dosunmu led all scorers with 25 points for Illinois. After the game, he blamed himself for not putting his teammates in a position to be successful.
"I have to help my team close out the game better," Dosunmu said. "It was a close game. We had ample opportunities to close down the stretch, and at the end of the day I fell I have to do a better job of putting my team in better position to close."
Fellow point guard Andres Feliz added 13 points and rallied the Illini to a second-half lead before running out of gas, and asking to be removed from the game. He said Frazier's absence was decisive.
"He (Frazier) does everything on the court," Feliz said, "so I think we missed that part from him."
Georgetown got 19 points from guard James Akinjo. Josh LeBlanc added 14 for the Hoyas.
Illinois is now 1-1 on the season. They'll travel to Hawai'i this weekend for the Maui Invitational, which starts Monday in Lahaina.