{"id":133341,"date":"2025-04-10T08:00:43","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T12:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=133341"},"modified":"2025-04-09T22:44:34","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T02:44:34","slug":"illinois-basketball-hotbed-international-talent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/10\/illinois-basketball-hotbed-international-talent\/","title":{"rendered":"Illinois Basketball: A Hotbed for International Talent"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Gravitating towards international talent has seen a significant increase in the college ranks. It should be because basketball is a global game. Illinois basketball has undoubtedly made a staple of finding incredible talent from outside the U.S. border. Those players are finding a home in the Big Ten, which has already had a deep history of it. Just look at what <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/08\/30\/michigan-basketball-wolverines-all-time-starting-lineup\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">Michigan<\/a> was able to do with Germany&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/moritz-wagner-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Moritz<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/franz-wagner-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Franz Wagner<\/a>. The Fighting Illini have become a hotbed for international talent.<\/p>\n<p>The 2025-26 Illini roster is going to have three very talented international big men. That comes off the back of having <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/kasparas-jakucionis-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kasparas Jakucionis<\/a>, who is a projected lottery pick in the upcoming NBA Draft. Illinois basketball has found a way to entice international players, and it&#8217;s only helping college basketball.<\/p>\n<h2>Illinois Basketball: A Hotbed for International Talent<\/h2>\n<p>It&#8217;s cool for a team like Illinois to land a guy from a top-level European team. That being <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/tomislav-ivisic-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tomislav Ivisic<\/a>, who played a big role this past season for the Illini despite dealing with an <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/articles\/cfb\/no-18-illinois-trying-to-regain-its-mojo-with-big-man-tomislav-ivisic-out-indefinitely\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">illness<\/a> in late January. He averaged 13 points, 7.7 rebounds and 2.3 assists in 32 games as a freshman. Tomislav has to be smiling now that Illinois has also added his twin brother <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/zvonimir-ivisic-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Zvonimir Ivisic<\/a> from Arkansas in the transfer portal.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Welcome to Champaign, Z<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udfe0 <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/6dhzUnUGex\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/6dhzUnUGex<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/VSi9ItDo0X\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/VSi9ItDo0X<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Illinois Men&#39;s Basketball (@IlliniMBB) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/IlliniMBB\/status\/1909035832826069077?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 7, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>What a deadly duo the Ivisic twins are going to be for Illinois basketball next season. If that wasn&#8217;t enough, head coach Brad Underwood was able to find a player from that same European ball club, SC Derby. This time in the form of a 6-foot-9 power forward, <a  href=\"https:\/\/247sports.com\/Player\/David-Mirkovic-46157488\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">David Mirkovic<\/a> from Montenegro. Like the Ivisic&#8217;s, Mirkovic is going to make Illinois frontcourt one of the deepest in the Big Ten.<\/p>\n<p>Mirkovic has averaged 8.8 points and 6.7 rebounds playing in the Adriatic League, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msn.com\/en-us\/sports\/other\/illinois-basketball-lands-another-international-big-man\/ar-AA1CuqtS?ocid=BingNewsSerp\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">according to Dave Eminian from the Peroria Journal Star<\/a>. The Fighting Illini aren&#8217;t messing around.\u00a0 But it doesn&#8217;t end there, as things could still shake up even more.<\/p>\n<h3>Dame Sarr Sweepstakes<\/h3>\n<p>If getting three players from the Adriatic League in Europe over the past several years isn&#8217;t enough, coach Underwood has made it clear he&#8217;s out for even bigger fish from across the Atlantic Ocean. Everyone knew Illinois made it big when they were able to get Jakcionis to come over from FC Barcelona.<\/p>\n<p>Now, they are once again in the running for another FC Barcelona star: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.on3.com\/db\/dame-sarr-249793\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dame Sarr<\/a>. He&#8217;s a player that isn&#8217;t necessarily going to choose Champaign, but it&#8217;s very clear he&#8217;s on Underwood&#8217;s radar. Sarr is 6-foot-6 and could easily fit in the Illinois lineup, especially if Kasparas heads to the NBA. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.on3.com\/user\/joe-tipton\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">On3 recruiting expert Joseph Tipton<\/a> has Illinois as a front-runner to land Sarr alongside the likes of Creighton and Arizona.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Dame Sarr was tremendous in Barcelona\u2019s win over Breogan in the ACB. \ud83d\udd34\ud83d\udd35<\/p>\n<p>18-year-old Italian prospect dropped 21 points, 5\/5 from two, 3\/5 behind the arc. Also added 1 rebound and 3 assists to the stats sheet. \ud83c\uddee\ud83c\uddf9\ud83c\udf1f<a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Eurospects?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#Eurospects<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/fUOFjCmnAI\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/fUOFjCmnAI<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Eurospects (@Eurospects) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Eurospects\/status\/1896306008668147972?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">March 2, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>If he does indeed choose Illinois, he&#8217;s going to join a very impressive recruiting class and Illini roster that&#8217;s hungry to compete next season and beyond. However, the roster ends up shaking out for Illinois basketball, It&#8217;s very clear that international talent has a home and a place in Champaign, Illinois.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a9 Benny Sieu-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gravitating towards international talent has seen a significant increase in the college ranks. It should be because basketball is a global game. Illinois basketball has undoubtedly made a staple of finding incredible talent from outside the U.S. border. Those players are finding a home in the Big Ten, which has already had a deep history [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5169,"featured_media":133457,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,773],"tags":[4136,66,49955,4137],"class_list":["post-133341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-college-basketball","tag-illinois-fighting-illini","tag-international-basketball","tag-kasparas-jakucionis","tag-kofi-cockburn"],"modified_by":"Jordan Pagkalinawan","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5169"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133341"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133458,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133341\/revisions\/133458"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/133457"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}