Just when it looked like Illinois might be worthy of serious top-25 consideration and good enough to make things interesting in the Big Ten, the Illini reminded the college basketball world of their flaws — both physical and mental — in Sunday’s win.

The Illini won by nine points against a team that was decimated by Purdue and Michigan. They were outrebounded by an athletic frontline. They failed to execute well against a zone defense. And two of the team’s best players took the day off.

This was not the team coach Bruce Weber wanted to see two days before Illinois opens Big Ten play at Purdue.

“I talked a lot about concentration since we got back (from Christmas) and being mentally here,” Weber said. “I don’t think we had the emotion we needed to play at a high level, and we need to get it going to compete Tuesday night.”

The Illini showed against Missouri that when they’re dialed in, they can be pretty good. And maybe Sunday’s game was a positive sign that they can win when so many players aren’t performing well. Not even Weber expects his team to have the energy it showed in St. Louis in every game.

But there has been a trend that has to be gnawing at Weber, and that’s the inconsistency of sophomores Demetri McCamey and Mike Davis, the team’s leading scorers. McCamey scored the Illini’s first three points Sunday and didn’t score again. Davis made one free throw. They combined to make one of nine shots.

“I hoped they’d have been a little better,” Weber said.

McCamey picked up his third foul with 17 minutes 45 seconds left in the game and played only two more minutes. Mike Tisdale and Trent Meacham carried the team with their 25 and 16 points respectively.

Weber has challenged players to become more consistent and some have failed to respond. One who responds regularly is Chester Frazier and he did so again. After recording nine assists against Missouri, the senior guard easily led Illinois with 11 rebounds Sunday.

Weber continued to hold Frazier up as the shining example of how to earn minutes even when you don’t score. Meanwhile, he pointed to McCamey and Davis as players who allow a lack of offensive success to impact their entire game.

“Chester gave emotion with how hard he played,” Weber said. “I’ve been on him about rebounding and today he outfought and outjumped some of the big guys for rebounds.”

And although Mike Tisdale didn’t do a lot of rebounding for a 7 foot 1 center, he earned a career-high 37 minutes with his offense. He matched his career high of 25 points on 10 of 18 shooting, mixing some short baseline jumpers with a few hook shots (including one lefty). The other issue that impacted Tisdale’s minutes was that backup Richard Semrau missed all of practice Friday and most of Saturday due to travel problems.

“I didn’t take (Tisdale) out in the second half,” Weber said. “I kept saying to my assistants, ‘Should we take him out?’ They said, ‘Heck no, he’s scoring every time.’ ”

Weber said the tempo of the game helped Tisdale survive the extra playing time. Eastern Michigan played a lot of zone and Illinois had long possessions, eliminating a lot of the up-and-down running that could have tired Tisdale.

Come Tuesday night, Weber hopes to see a little more of the fire and balance that Illinois has against Missouri.

“If we’re going to be good and consistent in the Big Ten,” he said, “that’s where we have to grow up and find that emotion and play hard every day. … We’ve got to get everybody playing at the level Trent and Chester and Calvin (Brock) played today.”