It’s sometimes easy to forget how close Decatur and Champaign-Urbana are. That fact was well noticed Sunday October 20th when John Groce, head coach for the University of Illinois men’s basketball program swung through town.
Groce was at the Hickory Point Golf Course in Forsyth this past Sunday for a special edition of “Sport Talk,” a radio show ran every Thursday from 5:00-7:00 p.m. on WSOY News Talk 1340 AM, hosted by Herald & Review writers, Tim Cain and Mark Tupper.
Coach Groce answered several questions about himself and about this year’s team in front of a crowd of nearly 300 people. He also signed autographs and took pictures with fans during commercial breaks from the show.
“These events are great, we have great fans,” Groce said when he arrived at the event. “People are fanatical about Illini basketball . . . we are very proud of that!”
During his time on air, Groce seemed highly optimistic about this year’s Fighting Illini.
“It takes one year to get to where you feel comfortable, it takes two years to get where you feel totally acclimated,” Groce said about still being somewhat new to the program.
Groce said he is enjoying building the program in such a competitive league, but that the team still has a lot of work to do.
“Obviously our league is terrific,” Groce said about the Big Ten. “I think the depth of our league will be even better than last year.”
When asked about the team, Groce was quick to comment on the amount of newcomers that will be hitting the floor.
“We have 9 fresh faces this year to add to the 5 veterans that we have on our team,” Groce said. “So we have a long way to go trying to connect on and off the court.”
The team’s roster for this year looks to be very deep with several athletic players. Groce and his staff brought in five freshman, including 6’3” guard Kendrick Nunn, and four transfer students during the offseason. Two notable transfers are 6’7” Jon Ekey from Illinois State, and Champaign native Rayvonte Rice, who came from Drake. The team will look to run a faster tempo offense than fans are used to seeing, and Groce said he wants fans to characterize this team as, “aggressive.”
“We’re long, we’re athletic, we’re very mobile and we’ve got to use that to our advantage,” Groce said.
The Illini opens up their season with two exhibition games against McKendree and Northwood University (Mich.), and opens their regular season November 8 at home against Alabama State.