Three Instant Observations From Illinois Basketball's 84-70 Loss to Michigan

It wasn’t Illinois’ first loss at the State Farm Center this season or even close to its worst performance of 2025-26, but the Illini – who were described for months as a national championship contender – had the misfortune of running into the genuine article on Friday.

In what was supposed to be a clash of Big Ten titans, No. 3 Michigan showed up in Champaign and showed out as the faster, more physical and fundamentally better team in a soup-to-nuts 84-70 shutdown of No. 10 Illinois. The win secured the outright Big Ten regular-season title for the Wolverines.

To add insult to injury, the man carrying the biggest stick in the beatdown of the Illini (22-7, 13-5 Big Ten) was Morez Johnson Jr., who transferred from Illinois to Michigan in the spring and on Friday delivered an emphatic 19 points and 11 rebounds – including several filthy dunks, a silky three and several savvy plays to free up or complement his new teammates.

Morez Johnson Jr. is having a time 😮‍💨 @umichbball pic.twitter.com/fSJFdZuKhE
— FOX College Hoops (@CBBonFOX) February 28, 2026

Johnson didn't go it alone – Aday Mara (19 points) and Yaxel Lendeborg (16) shared the spotlight, but practically every Wolverines rotation player seemed a value add on the floor in a wall-to-wall victory that Illinois coach Brad Underwood can't explain away with a casual "some nights the shots don't fall" excuse. The Illini were knocked around, beaten down the floor, out-executed and otherwise made to look like second-class citizens in their own building. Time will tell whether that's a better reflection of Illinois' quality or a case study in just how dominant this Michigan club really is.

Here are three more observations from Illinois' shocking home loss to the Wolverines:

1. Yaxel Lendeborg is the Big Ten Player of the Year

You wouldn’t think a guy who carried a modest 14.2-points-per-game average into Friday's game might be the best player in the Big Ten – but Yaxel Lendeborg isn’t just any guy.

No. 3 @umichbball has the edge on No. 10 Illinois at the half 👀

Expect a B1G second half coming 🔜 pic.twitter.com/R3Gz3mUhPA
— Big Ten Men's Basketball (@B1GMBBall) February 28, 2026

Lendeborg didn’t just chip in as a scorer against the Illini. He left his fingerprints – both the figurative and literal kind – all over the game. When he wasn’t draping himself all over Keaton Wagler, he was suffocating Kylan Boswell on the ball. He grabbed rebounds, finished around Illinois’ bigs at the rim, facilitated, hit threes and did it all with impeccable timing, seemingly turning back every Illini surge on his own until it broke them. Lendeborg even wore a Morez Johnson Jr. jersey in the pre-game warm-ups to take pressure off his teammate in his first game back at the State Farm Center in an opponents’ uniform.

Keaton Wagler has had a dream freshman season, but Lendeborg is the best, most indispensable player on the most dominant team in the Big Ten. He locked up POTY on Friday.

2. Keaton Wagler has adjustments to make

Late in the FOX broadcast of Michigan-Illinois, analyst and national treasure Bill Raftery said something to the effect that all was not lost for the Illini and that the game could be used as a learning experience. It will need to be.

In particular, Wagler had one of his toughest evenings since he arrived in Champaign. It's a testament to his talent and resilience that we're saying as much in a game that he ended with a game-high 23 points. But he went 7-for-17 from the floor and had just three assists against four turnovers. And it was even uglier than that stat line suggests.

Trying to figure out how Illinois kept a hand on this one... and how it ended in a bucket pic.twitter.com/HhMvFl4ll5
— Courtney Layne Brewer (@courtneylaynebr) February 28, 2026

Led by Lendeborg, the Wolverines bumped, jostled, smacked, thumped and hung all over Wagler with every step, dribble and ball fake. The assignment on Michigan's sideline was clear: Be physical with the skinny kid killing the rest of the Big Ten. Again, Wagler is a freshman who just led a game in scoring against what may be college basketball's best outfit. He's very good. But to take Illinois to the next level, he'll have to level up himself by building some reliable counters into his game when opponents – as they undoubtedly will – mimic the Wolverines and hit him with the rough stuff.

3. Matchup basketball wins – until the matchups don't matter

The most deflating aspect of Illinois' 14-point defeat – its widest losing margin of the season – was that the Illini didn't play all that poorly. They were beaten on the boards, though not by much (34-30). Their second-chance points – usually a massive advantage – was neutralized by Michigan. But the Wolverines' edge was minimal (22-20). Even the turnovers (10 apiece) were a wash.

But Illinois shot just 41.3 percent, including 31.0 percent on threes (9-for-29), and they had to fight like hell for every one of those buckets. The usual matchup-hunting approach rarely worked, mostly because Michigan has a skeleton key in Lendeborg, a human skyscraper in the 7-foot-3 Mara and athletic, cagey defenders everywhere else. Might the Illini shoot it a little better if they meet the Wolverines again somewhere down the line? Sure. Will the same approach yield different results? Not likely.

Aday Mara SLAM 😤 @umichbball

📺: FOX pic.twitter.com/TAVrrijTwk
— Big Ten Men's Basketball (@B1GMBBall) February 28, 2026

They could stand to take a page from their old teammate: Johnson set a subtle but savvy back-screen against Illinois' zone in the second half that freed up Mara for a soul-crushing dunk. It was a reminder that even simple off-ball actions – no matter the defensive scheme or opponent – can lead to easy buckets. The Illini are going to need more of them against Michigan and others of the Wolverines' caliber if they're going to fulfill the promise so many have predicted for them this season.