Northwestern beat Illinois in basketball

I stopped writing postgames for Northwestern basketball. It was too depressing! And, I mean, what was I going to write, anyway? "We were the worst team and lost by 35?"

Then came Illinois. Sorry. No. 23 Illinois.

I didn't expect to win this game, but, even as Northwestern sucks, they've tended to find a way to beat Illinois over the past few seasons. When I found out Dave Sobolewski was out, I got even more optimistic. I was still worried NU would get crushed wearing jerseys saying "CHICAGO'S BIG TEN TEAM," but, that was the worst case scenario, and I kind of expected it, so really, nothing bad could happen?

Then, Illinois came out and played a putrid, putrid, horrible basketball game. Lookit:

SIX FOR THIRTY ONE RT @NU_SportsLIVE: 1st half stats: pic.twitter.com/a7d5EloGdH

— Sippin' on Purple (@sippinonpurple) January 13, 2014

CRIMINY! 6 FOR DAMN 31! 0-FOR-8 FROM THREE! Some of it was due to Northwestern playing spirited defense and crashing the boards, but, man, bricks bricks bricks bricks.

However, at the half, I still thought NU would lose. They were down seven against a basketball team that was 13-3. This still should be a loss. And an 8-0 run to tie the dismally bad offensive game at 27 reinforced that belief.

Then, Tre Demps.

We've criticized him for chucking. We've criticized him for missing.

But the kid drilled three threes, back-to-back-to-back -- TRE TRE TRE -- and NU led by seven with less than four minutes to go.

They made it painful. When the Illini started pressing, NU literally could not get the ball across half court, turning the ball over approximately seven million times. The lead would eventually slim down to two points.

Just.

Like.

Football.

I thought there was a legitimate possibility NU would go 0-18 this year. We might still go 1-17. But we won a damn game. We won a damn game, and we won it against a ranked team -- a ranked team that happens to be a "rival" or something. A team that, um, might be on the tourney bubble come March, and might not want to have a loss to an impressively bad Northwestern basketball team on their resume.

Northwestern will never have the program that Illinois does in basketball. They'll probably never get the Chicago recruits Illinois swims in. Hell, they may never make the NCAA Tournament.

But, still, Northwestern is 5-4 against Illinois since 2009, and that's damn funny.

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