COLUMN: He's Back - That's The Ayo Illini Fans Were Promised
MADISON, Wis. -- There he is. There is the Ayo we were all promised would show up when needed the most.
On Dec. 7, after Illinois completed losses in late-game situations to Miami (Fla.) and at Maryland, I wrote a column suggesting sophomore start guard Ayo Dosunmu was M.I.A. for an Illini program that badly needed him.
Well, he's back. And in a big way.
The 544-word column one month earlier reads as exactly the opposite of what happened on cold January night in Madison. Ayo returned to the form and picked up another "roadkill" as he referred to the 71-70 win at Wisconsin.
Dosunmu's kills now include Spartan after a 2019 home domination of Michigan State's Cassius Winston, a turtle head after leading the Illini to a 2019 win over Maryland at Madison Square Garden and a stuffed carcass of Bucky Badger after taking out the Illini's 10-year bully in his own home.
The final four minutes and 16 seconds of the Illini's first win in Madison since 2010 and their first win over the Badgers after 15 failed attempts was exactly the "unfinished business" Dosunmu talked about as he spurned the NBA draft and returned to Champaign for at least one more season.
lIlinois guard Ayo Dosunmu (11) looks to shoot as Wisconsin guard D'Mitrik Trice (left) and forward Micah Potter look on at the Kohl Center. Dosunmu had 18 points and six assists in the 71-70 win at Wisconsin Wednesday night.
Mary Langenfeld/USA TODAY Sports
In every single one of the final six Illinois possessions had in Madison Wednesday, Dosunmu touched the basketball and was a focal point of directing the traffic of his other four teammates. In short, Ayo was exactly leader Illinois (11-5, 3-2) needed in that moment. In those six possessions, Dosunmu had three assists on 3-point shots (two to Alan Griffin and one to Trent Frazier) and then took over in the final two looks with a layup and a 3-pointer of his own to seal the victory.
"With that role of being a closer or a finisher late in games, I feel like it's not always about scoring," Dosunmu said. "I feel there are just times you have to make the right play. I hit Alan in transition. I hit Kofi (Cockburn) on a late lob. I hit Trent in the corner. I hit Alan for another three. That's four plays in a row where yeah, the play was called for me but that doesn't mean I have to shoot it. Now the defense is scrambling. I hit Kofi and his man is late getting over and I have a layup. I hit Alan and now his man is standing with him and now I have an iso situation. I feel like it's about playing the game the right way because ultimately, when it's time to close a game out, you'll be prepared to do that and it's your time to shine."
In what might have been the biggest understatement of the night, Illinois head coach Brad Underwood said he liked the late-game execution. He better have liked it. And here's some news for you, Underwood liked it not because of what was written on his offensive set notecard or what the third-year coach drew up on the dry erase board during timeouts. He liked it because his best player demanded he dictates offense instead of being dictated to.
"He's got what you don't coach," Underwood said Wednesday night. "He's not afraid. He's fearless. He's very, very poised. It takes a certain type of guy to want the ball in those type of situations and not fear the miss. He's been in those moments so often that he knows he's going to make it more often than not and so do we."
In that final 4:16, Dosunmu was a leader, unselfish and cold-blooded killer all in the same sequence. That's what stars do. That's the Ayo we were all promised. That's the Ayo who Underwood was never worried about. That's what NBA draft picks do when they're in college: lead, dominate, be calm when everything suggests you shouldn't be and know when it is time to be by far the best player on the floor. Dosunmu, who was the most important signee of the Underwood era of Illinois basketball, was all those things and more Wednesday night against the Badgers.
"We're going to protect our home floor. We have to do that but these are the games you want to win, these road wins because they're so hard to come by in the best conference in the world," Dosunmu said. "We still got more unfinished business. That was the whole thing about my (Twitter) hashtag of unfinished business. We got more things to do and that starts with Rutgers on Saturday."
If he continues to be those things, and all evidence supports he will, Dosunmu will have the Illini dancing in March for the first time since 2013. And a few months from then, the kid from Chicago will likely get to hear his name called in the first round and shake league commissioner Adam Silver's hand at the 2020 NBA Draft.