There's No Way Tonight Ends Poorly For Me (ILLINOIS VS. DUKE LIVE BLOG)

You don't really have to say much to set the stage when you're about to tip off in Cameron Indoor against the Duke Blue Devils so I'll shoot you straight. Never in my life have I needed a win as bad as I need my Fighting Illini tonight and I don't mean that from a gambling perspective. I mean that from an Everything perspective: spiritually, emotionally, sexually, professionally and literally every other appropriate adverb you can squeeze in there. I'm damaged fucking goods and boy do I need a bounce back.

Without beating a broken record with a dead horse, let me quickly remind you that in the last few fortnights the Cubs have let Jon Lester walk, said goodbye to Theo, non-tendered Schwarber and allowed Len Kasper to take a secondary broadcasting position for the secondary team in town. If we're multiply fractions then the Kasper move was a near 80% downgrade. Email me for an explanation on how I got to that number. 

Elsewhere the Bears have dropped 6 in a row while Mitch has looked good enough to maybe have changed the outcome in any of the Nick Foles's starts. All that while the defense lays down like Stan Bowman at a trade deadline. Without exaggeration it has never been this bad professionally.

So tonight we turn to the #6 Fighting Illini basketball team. My new and last hope for the 2020 year, and most probably the only thing I'll passionately care about for all of next year. This is basically it and I'm all fucking in whether you like it or not. Maybe you heard I played baseball there? LSU 2009 ring a bell? 

Longstanding inside jokes aside, this is my team. This is the year. Loaded squads like this come around once a decade if you're lucky and scout's honor we're going to milk the absolute shit out of it. Brad Underwood knows no other way. We asked him about it on Red Line Radio. 

Hard to find a bigger stage in the regular season non-conference schedule than Cameron Indoor. It's been 25 years since we last played there and could just as easily be another 25 more again. Fortunately this time we're going in there with some bad mother fuckers. Hit the tape and Go Illini.