Love this data and the comparison to Stoops is the ideal path for Illinois (realistic or not). Major kudos to the staff for bringing in higher quality this recruiting cycle, and hopefully complementing the group further with Cooper, Ford, and a couple more transfers (5th year QB? WR?). That said, there is a large jump between Stoops' average 247 rating and Illinois' since 2013. By AVR, Kentucky is bringing in a group of recruits that are the equivalent of 700-750th ranked recruit. For Illinois, they're bringing in the equivalent of the 1300-1400th ranked recruit. Now, you can argue that Kentucky/Stoops is finding success in a much tougher environment (SEC) with roughly the equivalent of talent disparity that Illinois is facing in the B1G West, which is fair.
Lovie NEEDS to show he's turning the corner (6-6 minimum) in order to maintain that 2018 AVR in a much bigger class, which is part of the problem, he brought in a much better class but much smaller numbers. He'll need to repeat this with 20-22 players in 2020. I'd also argue that the map will not be as friendly to Lovie and staff in 2020 as it was in 2019. The STL talent isn't as strong + Trinity connection/talent will not be as high + Illinois talent seems to be a secondary target for the staff. Also unlikely that the staff will be able to reel in new top-100 talents like this year (only option is Mookie Cooper (Texas Lean)).
Is .8600 a realistic target? No. Might be best to shoot for .8500, which would be a step up but still behind the majority of the B1G West schools. Hence the necessity of making a significant leap. Can Illinois football be 4-1 heading into the group of UM (home), Wisconsin (home), and Purdue (road) and somehow win two of those games? 6-2 with Rutgers (home), Michigan State (road), Iowa (road), and NW (home). Split those and finish 8-4, then a .8600 recruiting class score is possible (and lays the groundwork for taking that step forward).