Illinois’ Brad Underwood gushes over Andrej Stojavokic leveling up ‘95% of time’ he’s not scoring

Illinois moved to 16-3 on the season with a 89-70 victory over Maryland on Wednesday night. Earlier this season, head coach Brad Underwood called this Illinois team a coach’s dream. Now, Underwood is gushing about one of his players, Andrej Stojakovic.

“Yeah, I think the one thing you have to understand when you win is there’s no plays off.  There’s no days off. And in this league, if you do that, you get beat. I was really frustrated with the first start of the year because you know, I didn’t get to grind on him. I didn’t get to just demand and get after it with him defensively, and you know I’ve always known he was a capable scorer, but you know what do you do the 95% of the time when you don’t have the ball,” Underwood started with in his discussion of Stojakovic, per Sahil Mittal of The Daily Illini.

“He’s taken coaching at a really, really high level. He’s had to do it on the fly. He’s had to learn, have a lot expected of him. I  mean, maybe more than he’s even expected from himself in some cases. But I couldn’t be happier. Unbelievable teammate. Great listener. Unbelievable listener and a terrific learner. He wants to learn. He wants to do the other things. And you know, you throw in the nine rebounds tonight from a kid that in games couldn’t get a rebound. Yeah, he’s turning into one heck of a terrific player.”

Stojakovic has burst onto the scene as of late. In the game with Maryland, he dropped 20 points, with nine rebounds, an assist, and two blocks. Early in the season, he was finding points, but not helping elsewhere. Against Texas Tech in November, he scored 23 points, but with just one rebound and three assists. Now, he is consistently adding five or more rebounds, with a couple of assists, and making an impact on the defensive end of the court.

In the press conference, one of the longest answers from Underwood was his glowing review of Stojakovic. If his guard continues to play like this, Illinois is going to continue winning.

Illinois is now 16-3 and 7-1 in conference play.  Stojakovic and the Illini have a touch test on Saturday as they visit Purdue.

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