Live updates: Kentucky basketball vs. Illinois in NCAA Tournament
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Game day: Kentucky 84, Illinois 75
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Sunday night’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Illinois at the NCAA Tournament in Milwaukee.
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No. 3 seed Kentucky plays No. 6 seed Illinois in a second-round game of the Midwest Regional of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament on Sunday at the Fiserv Forum.
Tipoff is scheduled for 5:15 p.m. ET on CBS. Kevin Harlan, Stan Van Gundy, Dan Bonner and Lauren Shehadi comprise the broadcast team.
Ben Roberts, Mark Story, Ryan Hermens and yours truly will be reporting from courtside. Cameron Drummond will be monitoring the broadcast in Lexington. You can follow Ben’s updates on Bluesky at @benrobertshl. You can follow the rest of us on X/Twitter at @markcstory, @ryanhermens, @cdrummond97 and @johnclayiv.
NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament bracket
UK-Illinois live updates
Click here to view live updates on X/Twitter
Scouting report: Illinois
Illinois improved to 22-12 with its 86-73 win against Xavier in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday. The Illini are 16th in the KenPom adjusted overall efficiency rankings. Coach Brad Underwood’s team is 14th in adjusted offensive efficiency and 41st in adjusted defensive efficiency.
Illinois is fourth nationally in 3-point attempts at 30.1 per game but 296th in 3-point percentage at 31.4%. The Illini is ranked 18th in offensive rebound percentage at 35.9%. Underwood has said he wants his team to rebound 40% of their misses.
Underwood’s team is lead by three international stars. Kasparas Jakucionis, a 6-foot-6 freshman from Lithuania, leads the team in scoring at 15.0 points per game. Will Riley, a 6-8 freshman from Canada, is averaging 12.8 points. He scored 18 in the second half on Friday night. Tomislav Ivisic, the brother of former UK 7-footer Zvonimir Ivisic, is averaging 12.8 points. He made four 3-pointers in the win against Xavier.
Illinois men’s basketball site
Scouting report: Kentucky
Kentucky improved to 23-11 with its 76-57 win against Troy in its Midwest Regional first-round game on Friday. Coach Mark Pope’s Wildcats are 17th in KenPom’s overall adjusted efficiency rankings. UK is No. 11 in adjusted offensive efficiency and No. 54 in adjusted defensive efficiency.
UK ranks 23rd nationally in 3-point percentage at 37.4% and 33rd in 2-point percentage at 55.9%. It is 27th in 3-point defense at 30.6%. Troy was 8-for-32 shooting from 3-point range in its Friday night loss to Kentucky.
Otega Oweh leads the Cats in scoring at 16.4 points per game. He scored 20 in the win against Troy. Amari Williams is UK’s leading rebounder at 8.6 per game and leading assist man at 3.1 per contest. Williams grabbed 13 rebounds on Friday. Koby Brea entered the NCAA Tournament eighth nationally in 3-point percentage at 44.1%. He was 3-for-6 from beyond the arc against Troy.
Kentucky men’s basketball site
This story was originally published March 23, 2025 at 4:15 PM.
