Terrence Shannon Jr. drops 40, Illinois comes back to advance to Big Ten Tournament Championship Game

Illinois survived a furious offensive first half from Nebraska and came back to win a Big Ten Tournament semifinal, 98-87. The Fighting Illini were led by senior guard Terrence Shannon Jr., who finished with a game-high 40 points.

Shannon’s 40 points are a Big Ten Tournament single game record.

Illinois trailed by 11 points at the half, but turned the screws on the Nebraska offense that had torched its defense in the first half, holding the Cornhuskers to 36.1% from the field in the second half. And after giving up 51 first half points and allowing the Cornhuskers to shoot 58% from the field in the first 20 minutes, Illinois allowed Nebraska 36 points in the second half.

The Illinois offense also came to life outside of Shannon, who at one point had half of Illinois’ then-56 points (28 for him, 28 for the rest of the roster). The likes of Marcus Domask, Quincy Guerrier and Luke Goode all finished scoring in double figures, along with Shannon’s gaudy scoring total.

With the win, Illinois moves on to face Wisconsin in the Big Ten Tournament Championship Game on Sunday afternoon.

The result also comes with NCAA Tournament seeding implications for both teams, which are virtually assured to get at-large bids (if they don’t win the autobid, in Illinois’ case.) The Fighting Illini have an outside shot at climbing into the No. 3 seed line with another win. As for Nebraska, the Cornhuskers looked sharp and should hold strong as a likely high-single digit seed. On3’s James Fletcher currently has the Cornhuskers projected as a No. 7 seed in the West Region.

Guards Brice Williams and Keisei Tominaga paced the scoring for Nebraska with 23 and 18 points, respectively. Forward Rienk Mast added 15 points. For head coach Fred Hoiberg, the second half failed to live up to his half time desires.

“We have to do a better job of making them work for everything they get,” Hoiberg said to CBS Sports’ Tracy Wolfson at the half as his team led, 51-40. “Finishing off possessions. They’re getting too many offensive rebounds, balls are going off our hands. We have to do a better job finishing off possessions and when we do that, we do a great job getting out in transition.”

But counter to Hoiberg’s hopes, Shannon, who had been quiet in the final eight minutes of the first half, exploded for another 22 points in the second half to power his team to a big postseason win.