ERST LESEN! » he blue one day during last years World C

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Malcolm Hill made sure Illinois didnt step off the gas pedal Friday night so that the Illini could took care of business against Detroit Mercy, 89-69.The senior, who scored 25 points, led his team to a quick start after the intermission, when his team was up 39-30 and it seemed like the Titans would close the gap even more.Im always in an aggressive attack more, but this was one of those games where I needed to start strong in the second half, Hill said.Illinois (4-0) continued its strong start to the season in the opening game of the NIT Season Tip-Off tournament.The Illini had little trouble scoring, shooting 27of 52 from the field and 8 of 19 from 3-point range. Friday marked the second straight game the Illini had difficulty shooting from the free throw line however, finishing 27of 38.Tracy Abrams continued to have a strong return to basketball, scoring 15 points and finishing with four rebounds, including 2 of 3 from 3-point range.Groce knows the importance a balanced offense can have on his team.If you can have a balance of paint touches with that outside shooting, it puts opponents in dilemmas, Groce said.Detroit Mercy (1-2) had trouble keeping up with Illinois fast offensive pace from the start of the game. The Titans never led.Josh McFolley and Jaleel Hogan both led the way with 16 points for a team that finished shooting 43 percent from the field and 24 percent from beyond the arc.The Titans fell behind in most categories against the Illini, but Detroit Mercy head coach Bacari Alexander felt Illinois won the game down in the post, where the Illini won the rebound battle 39-29.They took advantage of those opportunities (in the post), Alexander said. (But) I like the direction this team is going in.BIG PICTUREIllinois: The Illini have played as they should against the type of opponents theyve faced so far this year. The team has one game left against relatively easy competition before facing No. 19 West Virginia at the Barclays Center in New York.Detroit Mercy: Although the game was never really close after the first few minutes, the Titans found some scoring opportunities and will need to continue to do that in the rest of the tournament.ROLE PLAYERGroce thought bench player D.J. Williams had his best overall performance of the year. The sophomore wing scored six points.LETDOWNAfter a strong start to the season, center Maverick Morgan had his worst night of the season, finishing with six points and zero rebounds and fouling out with more than five minutes left in the game.UP NEXTIllinois will continue play in the NIT Season Tip-Off tournament when it hosts Winthrop in Champaign on Monday.Detroit Mercy will try to bounce back Monday when it travels to Florida State to play its second game in the NIT Season Tip-Off.---More AP college basketball: http://collegebasketball.ap.org Golden Knights Jerseys 2021 . -- Sergey Tolchinksy scored his second goal of the game 3:56 into overtime as the Sault Ste. Vegas Golden Knights Shirts .J. -- Seven games into a disappointing season, New York Giants defensive catalyst Jason Pierre-Paul is getting the feeling hes back. https://www.cheapgoldenknights.com/ . No. 13-seeded John Isner and No. 21 Philipp Kohlschreiber were among six players who dropped out of the tournament on Tuesday, joining No. 12 seed Tommy Haas and two other players who withdrew on Monday. Vegas Golden Knights Store . Team physician Dr. Steve Traina performed the surgery Friday. Robinson was injured in a spill underneath the Nuggets basket during the first quarter of Wednesday nights loss to the Charlotte Bobcats. Golden Knights Jerseys China . The Masters champion and winner of last weeks Australian PGA has a three-round total of 14-under 199 at Royal Melbourne. "Im in a really good position for tomorrow," Scott said. With one ill-chosen word, Hope Solo turned a matter of soccer tactics into moral condemnation. With the help of U.S. Soccers opportunistic overreaction, a molehill became a mountain.Megan Rapinoe prefers to use the molehill that sports actually are to try to scale mountains.Competitive. Fierce. Humble. Badass.Those were the words Rapinoe chose while expressing disappointment with Solo in the aftermath of the veteran goalkeepers criticism of the Swedish team that eliminated Solo, Rapinoe and the rest of the U.S. womens national team from the Olympics. Rapinoes words were examples of what American players should be.Notably absent under the circumstances were other words that at one time might have been applied to the most popular team in womens sports: uncontroversial, inoffensive, bland.At the risk of putting words in the mouth of a player who is adept at speaking them herself, or even communicating silently through the act of kneeling during the national anthem, Rapinoe sounded disappointed not with the controversy surrounding Solo but the pointlessness of it.So after Rapinoe knelt Sunday during the anthem prior to a National Womens Soccer League game, she told espnWs Julie Foudy that the gesture of solidarity with San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick was born out of being disgusted with the way he has been treated and her desire for a more substantive conversation about race relations.It is debatable whether her gesture, as a one-time offering or if repeated, can accomplish that goal. We are in the midst of a national conversation, or shouting match, about the national anthem. Rapinoe undoubtedly extended the topic for at least another news cycle. That isnt necessarily the same thing as a conversation about the substance of any complaints.But if we truly hold to the idea that there is social value in younger generations, especially girls, watching Rapinoe pursue an athletic passion once reserved for men, then the same must be true of listening to her engage in what President Barack Obama days ago described as active citizenry.One cannot be true without the other. If all are to have opportunities, then all must have voices.Rapinoe noted this weeks ago when asked before an Olympic send-off game in Kansas City about the WNBA players who wore shirts in support of both Black Lives Matter and five police officers killed in a Dallas shooting; the players were fined by the WNBA as a result.Not everybody has to be an activist, but we have a pretty incredible platform being an athlete in this country, Rapinoe told Excelle Sports at the time. Sports is very valued and sort of glorified in this country, and if you want to have that voice, I absolutely think you should.And she does. She did long before any music started playing Sunday.As a college player at the University of Portland, soccer was all the larger world knew of her, if it knew of her at all. She was an inventive, sublimely skilled player with a staar-crossed history of injuries.dddddddddddd. At some point the world as she knew it intermingled with what the world knew of her.Soccer and social justice intersected. I think even before I came out [in 2012], Rapinoe said when asked about that evolution during the Olympics, I think you can sort of look at a big part of our fan base, and theres a lot of gay fans that we have. And so for me, I kind of always was aware of that. And then since coming out, I think its been even more, and something that I really embrace is that I can talk about it, talk to media about it, and sort of open up the conversation and not have it be such a taboo issue.She referenced an article she read that suggested the number of out gay athletes in the Olympics numbered only in the dozens among the thousands of athletes who competed.I think the more we can have these conversations and break down these walls and barriers and stereotypes, the more other athletes will feel comfortable coming out, hopefully.Her answer came in the context of one facet of her life, sexual orientation, but it is far from the only facet. She is among the national team players (as is Solo) who are pursuing an equal pay complaint against U.S. Soccer. When asked out of the blue one day during last years World Cup about the problems facing Metis youth in Manitoba, Canada, she didnt deflect the question with the standard response of being focused on soccer but instead admitted she knew the issue only a little -- and would like to know more. It is hardly a surprise that she felt moved to act now, too.The irony in all of this is that it seems entirely plausible that Rapinoe offended far more people who might show up to watch her play for the United States in its remaining games this fall than Solo did in calling the Swedish team a bunch of cowards for adopting a defensive game plan.Still, it is controversy with a point.A voice need not be loud to matter. And as with Solo, a loud voice does not always resonate.But controversy is never a reason to stay silent.As with any issue of free speech, plenty of people have turned during the Kaepernick saga to a quote often mistakenly attributed to the French philosopher Voltaire: I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.Some present it as a shield, others as an example of a naive nature. Yet one more debate without a resolution.But the image of Rapinoe kneeling before the start of a professional soccer game casts it in a different light. It was, after all, Evelyn Beatrice Hall who wrote those words, a woman who by the norms of the time in the early 20th century had to write under the pseudonym S.G. Tallentyre.It wasnt a womans place to have a voice on matters of consequence.Since thats no longer true, perhaps controversial conversations can bring about change. ' ' '