Illinois finally pulls away from Iowa late to reach first Final Four since 2005, end Hawkeyes’ NCAA tournament run

Ben McCollum’s dream run through the NCAA tournament is over.

No. 3 Illinois finally pulled away from the Hawkeyes late in the second half on Saturday night in their Elite Eight matchup to grab a 71-59 win at the Toyota Center in Houston. That officially secured the Illini their first trip to the Final Four since 2005, when they fell in the national title game to North Carolina.

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The Illini will now await either No. 1 Duke or No. 2 UConn in the Final Four next weekend in Indianapolis.

Iowa survives horn delay in first half

The Hawkeyes came out right away and opened the game on a 12-2 run, which put Illinois down by its largest deficit of the tournament so far in the first few minutes of the contest. But the game came to a screeching halt midway through the period after the buzzer inside the Toyota Center wouldn’t shut off.

Play stopped for 11 minutes in total, and both teams eventually came back out onto the floor running warm-up drills while the buzzer annoyed fans throughout the Houston arena.

Eventually, officials got the horn to shut off. But that left one man on the scorer’s table using an air horn for the rest of the game.

When play finally got going again, Iowa star Bennett Stirtz drilled a layup and then hit a 3-pointer right away to put the Hawkeyes back up by seven. Eventually, they took a four-point lead into the break. Stirtz had a game-high 15 points at halftime.

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Illinois ends Iowa’s run

While they looked unusually off in the first 20 minutes, the Illini finally shut Iowa down in the second half to pick up the win.

Illinois took its first lead of the game just minutes into the second half, after David Mirkovic converted an and-one layup. While Iowa was getting absolutely worked on the glass, and made just three of its first nine field goal attempts in the second half, the Hawkeyes hung in there for a while. But eventually, Illinois finally pulled away.

The Illini used a 10-1 run capped by an alley-oop from Zvonimir Ivisic, and held Iowa…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/mens-college-basketball/breaking-news/article/illinois-finally-pulls-away-from-iowa-late-to-reach-first-final-four-since-2005-end-hawkeyes-ncaa-tournament-run-002920954.html

Author : Ryan Young

Publish date : 2026-03-29 00:29:00

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