Illini Football 2025

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#105      
mhuml32
IlliniCaboose said:
I was at the Minnesota game that year. I'll always remember as we were leaving (very early) hearing Donnovan Young's dad yelling "he's got to go" in the concourse.
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That game was an important turning point for Illinois football. Every time I hear the discussions on here and elsewhere, I want to force the "keep Zook" folks to re-watch this game. Hands down the most frustrating game of Illinois football this century. There's a big difference between being talent inept (2003-2005) and what culminated in that game.

I firmly believe the Beckman era was so bad in so many ways that it created a lot of justifiable "Zook wasn't this bad" takes, but people reflected on his overall coaching record without understanding the context of his end-tenure, and created a narrative that what Zook was building in 2005-2008 was still happening in 2009-2011. Illinois leadership rightly learned that giving Turner the extra year at the end his coaching tenure was a mistake that wasn't worth repeating, but now fans point to that lack of reality as justification for a poor mistake.

The mistake was hiring Beckman, not firing Zook.
 
#107      
foby
mhuml32 said:
Agreed. I'm already growing a chip on my shoulder assuming that Illinois will not be ranked as high in next season's pre-season poll as they should be.
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#108      
DeonThomas
Fighter of the Nightman said:
I know a lot of people like him and nobody can question his commitment to the Illini (especially on a "years served" basis, lol), but it has always irked me that Loren Tate's writing style itself seems to lend itself to less-than-optimism. Even when writing about something good, every fiber of his being as a journalist is dying to throw in a "But, will it last?" or something like that. While having no ill will toward the guy himself, it has always led me to kind of hate his material.

Talk about two sellouts at Memorial Stadium? Tate will spend three paragraphs talking about how bad it used to be and one sentence seeming anywhere near excited, lol. JMO, of course...
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MOST RESPECTFULLY:
I believe LT has ~80 years of intimate Illini fandem, and essentially no one on the planet has more historical knowledge. I'll stack his experience, local sports knowledge, historical Illini perspective and "homer" writing skills up against anyone.

Totally respect and love the guy to death!

I tend to always give him the benefit of the doubt --- especially given his bruised fandem after following this "losing" football program for over eight decades. Yeah, he's a little bit sour at times, but who wouldn't be after all these years. (NOTE: I almost started this comment with "Four score and seven years ago.....")
 
#109      
DeonThomas
#118      
gary?
38 games under .500 beckman through lovie. now at 32 under through bielema. we could go 3 games over for the next 10 years and still be under .500. this century as a whole really messed up our all-time record; a miracle we're still over .500 there. by only 20 games. imagine if we we could've just achieved regular mediocrity since 2001.
 
#119      
SoCal Illini
SkyysNotFalling said:
I think we’re going to miss Bryant & Franklin more than we think.

I’ll go 9-3 again.
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I like the 9-3 part.

They will be missed, but I think guys in the WR room are ready to step up. Beatty in particular. Remember it took Bryant 4 years to get to where he was this past season. Bowl game showed that they can step up and they have a big win without 2024’s WR1 already. That should give them some confidence and swagger all off-season.
 
#120      
SkyysNotFalling
SoCal Illini said:
I like the 9-3 part.

They will be missed, but I think guys in the WR room are ready to step up. Beatty in particular. Remember it took Bryant 4 years to get to where he was this past season. Bowl game showed that they can step up and they have a big win without 2024’s WR1 already. That should give them some confidence and swagger all off-season.
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Kid from WVU is a nice add too. I’d be thrilled if we had someone replicate what Pat did for us this year but I think that’s a little far fetched. Kid is going to be a great NFL receiver and we were beyond lucky to have him as long as we did.
 
#121      
mhuml32
WR group is very likely to be worse in 2025 than 2024. But that's what happens in CFB after you lose players as good as Bryant and Franklin. Altmyer and the offensive line should be better, which should give the WR "better" opportunities to mask some of those deficiencies. Also, the '25 Illinois team should be asking less from the WR group than the '24 version. Altmyer, o-line, rushing game, return of Rusk, can handle a more prominent role.
 
#122      
ILLINISON1
Hoping this post is cathartic for me, these thoughts have been bouncing around my head for a while. In no certain order:

1) Never would I have thought the NIL era of college football would have been this good to the ILL. When I first caught wind of it my first thought was that we would be a warm up school that the more established teams picked our best or developed players from. I marvel at what it has done to our football fortunes.

2) I think the WR room will be every bit as good as this year. I think that room will see a lot of movement after spring and the a few entering the portal.

3) As far as I can see we have never had back to back years with double digit wins (Link). 2025 might be the first.

4) If BB does that and a few more like it over the next, say, 5 years, is he our best coach ever?

5) As bad as we have been recently the history of our program is above .500 @ 505%. We are 92nd all time winningest program will a minimum of 100 games played. That's 92 out of 135 (Link).

6) I did not know that money received from a bowl game by big 10 teams is given to the conference and not the program.

7) I wonder which coordinator will move first OC or DC. Does Luney want his own program? Does Art take over or move on?
 
#125      
Mr. Tibbs
ILLINISON1 said:
Hoping this post is cathartic for me, these thoughts have been bouncing around my head for a while. In no certain order:

1) Never would I have thought the NIL era of college football would have been this good to the ILL. When I first caught wind of it my first thought was that we would be a warm up school that the more established teams picked our best or developed players from. I marvel at what it has done to our football fortunes.

2) I think the WR room will be every bit as good as this year. I think that room will see a lot of movement after spring and the a few entering the portal.

3) As far as I can see we have never had back to back years with double digit wins (Link). 2025 might be the first.

4) If BB does that and a few more like it over the next, say, 5 years, is he our best coach ever?

5) As bad as we have been recently the history of our program is above .500 @ 505%. We are 92nd all time winningest program will a minimum of 100 games played. That's 92 out of 135 (Link).

6) I did not know that money received from a bowl game by big 10 teams is given to the conference and not the program.

7) I wonder which coordinator will move first OC or DC. Does Luney want his own program? Does Art take over or move on?
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post season winnings in all sports go into a pot and get shared equally with each other with the B1G conference itself also getting a share. at least that is how it was done in the 1980’s .

with regards to expenses incurred re going to bowls , schools are given an allowance for that . but I do not believe it covers the band .

not sure that all conferences do this . I would think many don’t
 
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