Purdue 24, Illinois 17 Postgame

[Illinirog70]

Welp...I'll stick with my three win prediction... but I'm not sure where our third win comes from.

Did you see that Iowa held Jeremiah smith to 208 yards and only two touchdowns? Much better defense!

At least basketball season isn't THAT far away-- Men's and women's.

 

[Fly Illini Fly!]

https://twitter.com/x/status/2106532668892385476

This is just brutal. He's literally missed half the year. Hopes of even limping to a bowl game are slim at this point.

 

[MoCoMdIllini]

I know recency bias will be strong in here, but what do you think our chances are of winning three more games? I see @ MSU, @Maryland, and Nebraska as possible wins. Thoughts?

Please be Maryland. I'm still planning on going.

 

[WyattEarp]

7. Is your base playbook for establishing the run game practical, utilitarian, and pragmatic? Or is it the kind of thing a caveman might scrawl on a rock?

 

[mhuml32]

Whoever was in charge of the transfer portal, NIL, transfer talent evaluation, should be fired immediately.

 

[Fly Illini Fly!]

Purdue's first BIG win in 1,043 days.

 

[PNWIllini]

I know recency bias will be strong in here, but what do you think our chances are of winning three more games? I see @ MSU, @Maryland, and Nebraska as possible wins. Thoughts?

Barring a miracle recovery this is a 2-3 win team.

But if they figure it out 7-8 are still possible.

 

[AugustWest]

Don’t know what happened to Houser and our entire offense today. That aside.. this defense does nothing that was promised (confuse/attack). We get no pressure, we leave our DB’s on an island and they also suddenly forgot how to cover. Linebackers are weak and slow. Arm tackle after arm tackle. Disappointing.

 

[IlliniInCAN]

There are so many things to dissect here it’s hard to know where to start. For now, the number 1 issue for me is:

Recruiting and talent evaluations - this is the primary area of concern for me. We saw Cignetti bring in a bunch of lower level players up and they were studs. No big budget, no p4 pitch and that dude got nfl players to 2 lower school than IL (Indiana one of the few that would qualify for such a statement prior to his arrival). He identified them and locked them down, then coached them up.

The level of talent and speed is so poor on IL’a roster right now, they likely wouldn’t compete even a level down at the moment. The team speed is horrific, the skill positions are awful. When Dixon is your best player in O, that’s bad. It’s not that he’s bad, he’s a 3rd wr option on a CFP team, but not a true 1.

And when you have Krutz as a regular player on D, that’s bad. He’s like water boy level on an CFP team. And he’s cornerstone of this defense.

Bottom line, BB has utterly failed at talent eval outside of the QB position. He’s wiffed on every DC not named Ryan Walters and he think his O line is back in the Wisconsin glory days when they aren’t even half that.

This team is light years behind in talent and recruiting and it’s not all NIL related.

Find a team that is playoff bound and try to enjoy the ride for the season. Cause the dream of IL one day being a regular CPF participant just may never happen TBH.

 

[Fly Illini Fly!]

Another huge game for Dixon: 10 catches on 15 targets. 116 yards and a TD.

Houser's passes look noticeably worse throwing to anybody else.

 

[Pikeillinifan]

It seems like the program took a giant step backwards today. I hope that’s not the case, this this loss is on the coaches and staff. Poor effort and even worse coaching decisions.

 

[Pikeillinifan]

There are so many things to dissect here it’s hard to know where to start. For now, the number 1 issue for me is:

Recruiting and talent evaluations - this is the primary area of concern for me. We saw Cignetti bring in a bunch of lower level players up and they were studs. No big budget, no p4 pitch and that dude got nfl players to 2 lower school than IL (Indiana one of the few that would qualify for such a statement prior to his arrival). He identified them and locked them down, then coached them up.

The level of talent and speed is so poor on IL’a roster right now, they likely wouldn’t compete even a level down at the moment. The team speed is horrific, the skill positions are awful. When Dixon is your best player in O, that’s bad. It’s not that he’s bad, he’s a 3rd wr option on a CFP team, but not a true 1.

And when you have Krutz as a regular player on D, that’s bad. He’s like water boy level on an CFP team. And he’s cornerstone of this defense.

Bottom line, BB has utterly failed at talent eval outside of the QB position. He’s wiffed on every DC not named Ryan Walters and he think his O line is back in the Wisconsin glory days when they aren’t even half that.

This team is light years behind in talent and recruiting and it’s not all NIL related.

Find a team that is playoff bound and try to enjoy the ride for the season. Cause the dream of IL one day being a regular CPF participant just may never happen TBH.

The team speed thing is mind boggling, we’ve seen the lack of speed for years and there doesn’t seem to be an effort to improve it.

 

[jmwillini]

 

[biglug58]

We were at the game today. Amazing homecoming crowd, tailgating, and atmosphere. Gorgeous day. And we lay a total egg. So disappointing.

 

[Keisersose]

We are playing desperate and making dumb decisions bc we are not operating from a point of strength.

Squib it bc you think maybe a DT that Purdue has out there might bobble it? When your defense has stopped them twice in a row right in front of the student section? This is right after you made it a 1 possession game and are down 6. Basically handed them a FG but they got a TD anyway.

Passing up a FG that woulda have made it a 1 possession game at the end of the 3rd quarter?

you put all your money on offense and you get this? If we were losing shootouts that would make some sense.

Defense gave the offense a chance to win today and also against Duke.

 

[IlliniHardwood]

Guys…. The scoreboard and whatever other stadium upgrades the money from Gies goes towards is not, nor was he ever going to, designate it for the NIL. This narrative needs to stop. They are apples to oranges comparisons of donation types. Could Gies have given to the NIL? Sure. He didn’t want to. End of story.

No. The idea that all of this money is tracked like there's an air tag on every red cent is as preposterous as thinking the NCAA has any real control over the direction of revenue-producing "college" sports, especially in the B1G and SEC. With regard to money in college sports, we are as much in the wild west as we were pre-NIL; in this era, full transactions are just disguised by "legal" agreements.

 

[fatt lacosse]

we have one home win against purdue since 2010, and it took a 10 win team to do it, and they just barely did so after forcing overtime and surviving a 2 point attempt

 

[Pikeillinifan]

Does anyone know why we don’t play Barnett, especially after a few good runs against SIU?

 

[illini80]

Brets comments were wholly unsatisfying. Not sure what he could have said, but I certainly don’t feel any better. I know he cares about this program, but he has his work cut out for him trying to salvage something out of this year and hold the program together. His loyalty to A Henry led him to make a bad decision on the defense. Now he has to fix it. He will have some grace, but it won’t last long. I think he did a good job of handling NIL in the past, but this shows how quickly that can fall apart.

Enjoy the beautiful weather this week and forget about football for a few days.

 

[Keisersose]

Somebody explain again how the millions of dollars spent on the giant video board could not be spent on fielding a competitive football team.

So aliens can laugh at us while watching from space?

I get what you are saying. But the video board is awesome. And it didn’t lose today’s game or the game against Duke.

 

[LvilleILL1]

Pretty inexcusable. Had a feeling this would be a poor year though. Bret is going to need to have a good year next year, I will say that.


14 days to basketball.

 

[PleaseMakeABowlGame]

Does anyone have insight on our 4th down success percentages?

Feels like we fail every time.

 

[the juiceman cometh]

 

[Cook]

Whoever was in charge of the transfer portal, NIL, transfer talent evaluation, should be fired immediately.

This guy? This has been a problem for several years. However, I believe we’ve also heard ppl in the program think he’s great, but why I don’t know.

 

[illiram]

Not taking the 3 points to make it a one scroe game told me everything I needed to know. DO NOT quit on your team. Had I been coach, we would have kicked that FG and the whole dynamic would have felt different and maybe been different. You CANNOT go for that and miss or the game is basically over. Who authorized that? Was it Lunney or Bielema, or a combination?