Illinois wins first exhibition game in Spain

Luckily this one was just an exhibition.

Illinois opened its trip to Spain on Sunday with a come-from-behind 84-73 win over the Madrid All-Stars.

To be transparent, game wasn’t televised or broadcast anywhere, so everything you’re reading here comes from releases from the team and a box score of the game.

It wasn’t the prettiest of games for the Illini, who shot 3-of-25 from three (12%) and 32-of-74 from the field (43%). But a big 25-12 fourth quarter pushed Illinois to the 11-point win.

Big scorers for the Illini included center Dain Dainja (16 points), Sencire Harris (14) and Terrence Shannon Jr. (12). A lot of guys saw extended playing time in this game, so Brad Underwood surely wouldn’t be using this deep of a bench in February.

“We were coming off the long trip over and hadn’t done any shooting for a few days, so I knew it would be a slow start,” Underwood said in a statement on FightingIllini.com.

Assistant Tim Anderson led Illinois on Sunday. A different assistant will step into the head coaching role for each game on the trip.

The Illini will now do some sight seeing in Madrid before heading to Valencia.

The next game — again, no broadcast — is Wednesday against Valencia.