Over the past few years, we've had some good teams and gotten close to #1 a number of times, but never quite made it there. Well, after the latest polls were released yesterday, the Illini fans can now officially say we are the #1 team in the nation.
Yeah, it's still very early in the season, so of course a lot can change between now and March. And we all know that the real prize in college basketball isn't being named #1 in December, but to make a run at the Final Four in St. Louis and the national championship. Still, there's something about the sound of "the top-ranked Fighting Illini" that has an especially sweet ring to it. If nothing else, it will help in recruiting I guess.
The encouraging thing is, I think this team actually deserves its high ranking from what we've seen of it so far. Solid starting five, possibly the best of any team in the country, and the bench isn't bad either. Also, it means something extra that we didn't just back into the #1 spot by teams ahead of us losing. We scheduled tough teams early on, and beat them, including the incumbent #1, to earn that honor. Let's just hope they keep playing well from here on out and make the rest of this season a great one.
