What Illinois Basketball Must Prove Against Baylor in Exhibition Game

It's spooky season, so want to give Illinois fans a scare? Here’s an idea: Name any Big Ten guard from the 2025-26 campaign. We’ll go first: Jeremy Fears Jr., Nick Boyd, John Blackwell, Donovan Dent. Shall we go on?

OK, just one more – an honorable mention: Kayden Mingo. As a Penn State freshman guard, Mingo poured in 16 points against the Illini while adding five assists (and four steals, for good measure) in a too-close-for-comfort Illinois win.

On Friday, Illinois will again run into Mingo, now donning a Baylor uniform. So what can the Illini’s performance against Mingo tell us? Let’s break it down:

Will Baylor's Kayden Mingo torch Illinois, a la Cincinnati guard Tylen Riley?

Last season, time and again, Illinois was left absolutely bewildered by elite Big Ten guards. And that was with supposed defensive stopper Kylan Boswell, who is now gone. Who's up next?

Well, through one exhibition game, the answer seems to be ... nobody. Cincinnati’s Tylen Riley put up 31 points and 13 assists (against just three turnovers) vs. Illinois on Saturday, and – quite obviously – no Illini defender stepped up to put the brakes on him.

We know: Didn’t we just say defensive shortcomings in exhibition games aren’t telltale signs? That is unequivocally true. And coach Brad Underwood admitted after the game that his Illini had “talked personnel” but didn’t talk X’s and O’s.

So Underwood’s group knew the rundown on Riley. Yet they seemingly didn’t have a player who could get in front of him and stay there. Riley’s playmaking was heavily out of ball-screen action. So, to be fair, Illinois may not have had a well-thought-out plan for that (by Underwood’s non-design).

But most of Riley’s scoring was him just sizing up individual defenders and getting buckets in one-on-one situations. And, spoiler: even superb X’s and O’s scouting won't help make a player a better on-ball defender.

Riley didn’t discriminate, either. Andrej Stojakovic got a few buckets. So did Quentin Coleman. Jake Davis, too, along with a few teammates.

A day after Riley made it rain on the Illini, Mingo and Baylor took on – and took down – preseason No. 1 Florida in Jacksonville. In the Bears' overtime victory, Mingo registered 31 points (9-for-15 shooting), eight rebounds and four assists. He drew a whopping 11 fouls.

Mingo showcased a much-improved three-point shot, got downhill, displayed his fancy footwork (he had one really nice step-through) and tossed in a few tough-to-contest push floaters.

Can Illinois basketball stop Baylor's Kayden Mingo?

The one-dimensional scorers are easier for Illinois (and any defense) to slow down. But Mingo can get buckets in a lot of ways – which means the Illini are probably going to have yet another long night against a high-level guard. 

The expectation is that Underwood doesn’t go out of his way to tailor a game plan to shut down Mingo. So he’s going to get his, to an extent. But will any of the Illini – namely Stojakovic or Coleman, the latter of whom has quickly earned a reputation as a fierce, high-motor competitor – take it upon themselves to keep Mingo from dominating?

The answer to that question can say a lot about whether or not Illinois is going to have the lockdown perimeter defender it’s looking for in 2026-27. And, again, if Mingo goes off because of team breakdowns, so be it. (That should quickly improve as the season gets underway.)

But if he isolates Illini players and blows by or bombs away for buckets all night, then that means Underwood may not have the level of perimeter personnel he seems to think he has on that end. And that could become a season-long sticking point.