Illini Football 2024

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#76      
aaeismacgychel
ktal said:
2012 - 2022, four games with home attendance over 50k. You can kill a program like that.

It makes what Josh is doing all the more impressive, because his first hire was a complete failure. Lazy Lovie.
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Not to be a Lovie apologist, but I really think we need to view his time here under a different lens considering all that has happened after him. Yes, he didn't succeed on the field, but man, did he help us recover image wise from the Beckman tenure. He honestly restored legitimacy to our program on a national level and actually did bring in some major diamond in the rough future All B10 recruits. He left us in much better shape than when he came here. Was it what we wanted? Of course not, but considering the complete and utter mess Beckman left us with (not just talent and national perception issues, but also major legal problems and NCAA law breaking issues), him just taking the job was something we should be thankful for.

I'll say this, I'm an Illini fan for life, always will be. And man, I've seen some truly terrible seasons, as we all have. I sat through the 1 win season, saw us go 0 for the B10 multiple years, sat through absolute shellackings until the final whistle, but the only time I ever no longer felt proud to be a fan and questioned whether I could even support this team anymore was during Beckman's tenure. That was absolute rock bottom for me. He destroyed so much. Bret is building a strong foundation if not the start of a house right now, and he should get so much praise from the fanbase for that, but Lovie kicked out the squatters and cleaned up the toxic waste and used needle dumpsite and levelled the crackhouse on top of it enough to allow us to sell the property and build that foundation. In my opinion, any residual hate of Lovie needs to go away. He helped us, maybe not in the way we wanted or hoped, but he really did help.
 
#77      
Battle89
Fighter of the Nightman said:
Yeah, I distinctly remember the perception that RG's DIA was frugal and seemingly did not see the value in paying big bucks. We almost seemed to take pride in looking at the OSUs of the world as "wasting money" rather than rightfully being jealous of them for mobilizing their resources, lol. Though he had many faults, I do think Mike Thomas attempted to start to change that narrative by sending a message that Illinois was a destination that would "pay up," but of course the problem was that he was unable to court any actually good coaching candidates, lol. It's easy to forget this, but us hiring Lovie was absolutely national news and a "splash hire." There's a reason we were able to sell out his second home game after not sniffing a sellout for years ... fans were genuinely optimistic, even if that optimism fell apart rather quickly.

Josh hiring Bielema was truly an awesome move. Illinois SHOULD be a "big money" school with its size, alumni base and instate population ... period! We are not some small elite private school that has only alumni as fans, we are the state flagship for one of the biggest states in the country, and we have a MASSIVE alumni base. Our coaches used to be paid poorly compared to Big Ten rivals, and it is nice to see Bret paid in the top half of what is now a huge conference with multiple national powers:

Ryan Day (Ohio State) - $10,271,250
Lincoln Riley (USC) - $10,040,000
James Franklin (Penn State) - $8,500,000
Curt Cignetti (Indiana) - $8,000,000 [very recent new contract]
Luke Fickell (Wisconsin) - $7,625,000
Jedd Fisch (Washington) - $7,500,000
Kirk Ferentz (Iowa) - $7,000,000
Dan Lanning (Oregon) - $6,624,999
Bret Bielema (Illinois) - $6,500,000
Jonathan Smith (Michigan State) - $6,000,000
PJ Fleck (Minnesota) - $6,000,000
Mike Locksley (Maryland) - $5,500,000
Matt Rhule (Nebraska) - $5,500,000
Greg Schiano (Rutgers) - $4,000,000
Ryan Walters (Purdue) - $4,000,000
DeShaun Foster (UCLA) - $3,000,000

You'll see a lot of casual fans online say stuff like, "Bret Bielema is paid almost as much as Dan Lanning?!" or stuff like that ... and it's like, dude, we HAVE to pay that much to get a great candidate and keep him, and we should be PROUD that the DIA has that kind of cash, not pinching its pennies that are not ours, haha.
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Yup, that was my first thought, Dan Lanning deserves a raise. Second thought was $4M per win in West Lafayette...
 
#79      
ktal
JFGsCoffeeMug said:
For all his faults, Lovie helped stabilize our football program and set the table for the current upswing.
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I'm glad people are defending Lovie from my calling him Lazy Lovie. I agree with all of you, and I was among the most excited when he was hired. He was a national splash, punched above our weight (on paper at least), and helped change the perception of the program. I don't disagree with any of that.

But the reason I was so elated is because he came in with doubters, and I expected him to prove them wrong. Frankly, I thought he would see his time here as his opportunity to build a program The Lovie Way; not super exciting or risky, but reliable and fundamentally sound from stem to stern. But that kind of thing takes an absolute workaholic...actually, an entire team of them. And good ones, not just logging long hours being unproductive.

If the posters on this board are to be believed, Lovie simply didn't do the work. That's why I called him Lazy Lovie; he knew the work it would take when he took the job, and he knew how to do the work. But he didn't do the work.

What I wanted Lovie to build is being built by Coach B. Tough, smart and dependable, in his words. I wish Lovie had done this but am grateful Bret is doing the work, now.

And my main point was props to Josh. With all big three ranked, and a bunch of other programs rising or already great, this is easily the best I've seen DIA run since I became an Illini in '95. Lots of tough years, as many of you know all too well.
 
#82      
Subortus
aaeismacgychel said:
Not to be a Lovie apologist, but I really think we need to view his time here under a different lens considering all that has happened after him. Yes, he didn't succeed on the field, but man, did he help us recover image wise from the Beckman tenure. He honestly restored legitimacy to our program on a national level and actually did bring in some major diamond in the rough future All B10 recruits. He left us in much better shape than when he came here. Was it what we wanted? Of course not, but considering the complete and utter mess Beckman left us with (not just talent and national perception issues, but also major legal problems and NCAA law breaking issues), him just taking the job was something we should be thankful for.

I'll say this, I'm an Illini fan for life, always will be. And man, I've seen some truly terrible seasons, as we all have. I sat through the 1 win season, saw us go 0 for the B10 multiple years, sat through absolute shellackings until the final whistle, but the only time I ever no longer felt proud to be a fan and questioned whether I could even support this team anymore was during Beckman's tenure. That was absolute rock bottom for me. He destroyed so much. Bret is building a strong foundation if not the start of a house right now, and he should get so much praise from the fanbase for that, but Lovie kicked out the squatters and cleaned up the toxic waste and used needle dumpsite and levelled the crackhouse on top of it enough to allow us to sell the property and build that foundation. In my opinion, any residual hate of Lovie needs to go away. He helped us, maybe not in the way we wanted or hoped, but he really did help.
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The fact that the program has improved since Lovie was fired doesn't necessarily mean that he "set the table" for Bielema. Lovie was awful. The program was terrible. Lousy records, sloppy play, bad coaching, too many penalties. Sure, he or his staff recruited some superb individual athletes who were given tons of playing time (probably prematurely) and eventually became outstanding players and went on to the NFL - but the teams were bad and it was not enjoyable for the fans to watch. I just don't buy the argument that Lovie somehow brought stability to the program. Lots of coaches could have performed as well or better than Lovie. He was different than Beckman, but neither one should ever have been hired.
 
#83      
chiefini
Subortus said:
The fact that the program has improved since Lovie was fired doesn't necessarily mean that he "set the table" for Bielema. Lovie was awful. The program was terrible. Lousy records, sloppy play, bad coaching, too many penalties. Sure, he or his staff recruited some superb individual athletes who were given tons of playing time (probably prematurely) and eventually became outstanding players and went on to the NFL - but the teams were bad and it was not enjoyable for the fans to watch. I just don't buy the argument that Lovie somehow brought stability to the program. Lots of coaches could have performed as well or better than Lovie. He was different than Beckman, but neither one should ever have been hired.
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As a 40 year season football ticket holder, I agree that Beckman shouldn’t have ever been hired, but I totally disagree that Josh shouldn’t have hired Lovie. The excitement and hope Louie’s hire brought helped not only bring fans out of the doldrums, it brought fannies into the seats. Yes, it didn’t turn out the way Josh, fans, or I hoped, but at the time, it was a brilliant move in my humble opinion. Although I was dubious about Josh hiring Bielma, Bret quickly dispelled all my doubts, and I am now thrilled that he is my Illini coach, and as more and more fans buy season tickets, it seems Illini Nation agrees.
:illinois: :hailtotheorange: :illinois:
 
#84      
DeonThomas
DREAMING: I realize we're not even favored to beat Rutgers, but what would a 10-3 season, with a bowl win over an SEC opponent mean for the program?
Realistically, I guess we'd need to stack two or three of those 8-9-10 win seasons to have a truly meaningful impact on recruiting.

2022: 8-5
2023: 5-7
2024: 10-3
2025: 10-3 (CFP berth)
2026: 9-4

If we could accomplish this, I'd have to say that BB has legitimately built a "top one-third" program in the Big10. And perhaps we'd have a few 4-5 star players on the roster.
 
#85      
pvaughn8
chiefini said:
As a 40 year season football ticket holder, I agree that Beckman shouldn’t have ever been hired, but I totally disagree that Josh shouldn’t have hired Lovie. The excitement and hope Louie’s hire brought helped not only bring fans out of the doldrums, it brought fannies into the seats. Yes, it didn’t turn out the way Josh, fans, or I hoped, but at the time, it was a brilliant move in my humble opinion. Although I was dubious about Josh hiring Bielma, Bret quickly dispelled all my doubts, and I am now thrilled that he is my Illini coach, and as more and more fans buy season tickets, it seems Illini Nation agrees.
:illinois: :hailtotheorange: :illinois:
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I hope someday I can get hired for a high profile position and completely bomb while still be remembered fondly because I'm less of an embarrassment than my predecessor.
 
#87      
aaeismacgychel
pvaughn8 said:
I hope someday I can get hired for a high profile position and completely bomb while still be remembered fondly because I'm less of an embarrassment than my predecessor.
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For a working comparison this would be like you taking over a company that was just found guilty of multiple environmental, safety, and ethics violations, lost all of their best employees, and saw their stock prices tank by 90% as the company is lambasted and drug through the mud by the national media and late night talk shows for months.

Now while you never actually got the company back to profitable and in fact the company was still hemorrhaging money under your leadership, you came on and cleaned up the violations, got the company back in line with government regulations, hired in a few high potential employees, and even bolstered the stock price, keeping the company from completely going bankrupt prior to getting fired. Yes, the person who replaced you made the company profitable again and the future looks very promising under their guidance, but at the same time, yeah, you were a financial failure, but I bet there's a number of people who will look at you in a fonder manner than you think you deserve.
 
#88      
IlliniFanTX
aaeismacgychel said:
For a working comparison this would be like you taking over a company that was just found guilty of multiple environmental, safety, and ethics violations, lost all of their best employees, and saw their stock prices tank by 90% as the company is lambasted and drug through the mud by the national media and late night talk shows for months.

Now while you never actually got the company back to profitable and in fact the company was still hemorrhaging money under your leadership, you came on and cleaned up the violations, got the company back in line with government regulations, hired in a few high potential employees, and even bolstered the stock price, keeping the company from completely going bankrupt prior to getting fired. Yes, the person who replaced you made the company profitable again and the future looks very promising under their guidance, but at the same time, yeah, you were a financial failure, but I bet there's a number of people who will look at you in a fonder manner than you think you deserve.
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Great analogy. Lovie was never going to come in and bring us national championships, BIG championships, or even a winning big ten slate, but it DID bring back the casual fan. In my mind, it was like OH Lovie would want to come here? I thought we were resigned to hiring the Tim Beckman's of the world...
 
#89      
Illini2010-11
aaeismacgychel said:
For a working comparison this would be like you taking over a company that was just found guilty of multiple environmental, safety, and ethics violations, lost all of their best employees, and saw their stock prices tank by 90% as the company is lambasted and drug through the mud by the national media and late night talk shows for months.

Now while you never actually got the company back to profitable and in fact the company was still hemorrhaging money under your leadership, you came on and cleaned up the violations, got the company back in line with government regulations, hired in a few high potential employees, and even bolstered the stock price, keeping the company from completely going bankrupt prior to getting fired. Yes, the person who replaced you made the company profitable again and the future looks very promising under their guidance, but at the same time, yeah, you were a financial failure, but I bet there's a number of people who will look at you in a fonder manner than you think you deserve.
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The only thing you forgot to include would be hiring their kid for a position they were unqualified for, which helped keep the company from getting to profitability. Otherwise, I completely agree with the general premise.

The Lovie hire was outside the box (at a time we needed outside the box) and brought in a level of true professionalism that was absent of the program for ages. Ultimately it did not work out, but we are kidding ourselves if we think that Josh was going to be able to bring in a better hire than Lovie at the time he did (or the season later if he held off the hire). Not many (high quality) candidates would have lined up for the dumpster fire that Lovie inherited. The on-field results were not good, but my gosh did we step forward with heavy donations and upgrades to our facilities during that timeframe (all of which put us in a position to lure in Coach B). In addition, the Lovie hire helped to repair many of the PR issues that we had (did not cringe the coaches press conferences like the ones we had with his predecessors). Lovie deserves the scrutiny for the way he coached (and some of his coaching hires), but he also should get some credit for helping to repair the culture that was in the dumpster when he arrived.
 
#90      
Chukwuwumba
Fighter of the Nightman said:
Yeah, I distinctly remember the perception that RG's DIA was frugal and seemingly did not see the value in paying big bucks. We almost seemed to take pride in looking at the OSUs of the world as "wasting money" rather than rightfully being jealous of them for mobilizing their resources, lol. Though he had many faults, I do think Mike Thomas attempted to start to change that narrative by sending a message that Illinois was a destination that would "pay up," but of course the problem was that he was unable to court any actually good coaching candidates, lol. It's easy to forget this, but us hiring Lovie was absolutely national news and a "splash hire." There's a reason we were able to sell out his second home game after not sniffing a sellout for years ... fans were genuinely optimistic, even if that optimism fell apart rather quickly.

Josh hiring Bielema was truly an awesome move. Illinois SHOULD be a "big money" school with its size, alumni base and instate population ... period! We are not some small elite private school that has only alumni as fans, we are the state flagship for one of the biggest states in the country, and we have a MASSIVE alumni base. Our coaches used to be paid poorly compared to Big Ten rivals, and it is nice to see Bret paid in the top half of what is now a huge conference with multiple national powers:

Ryan Day (Ohio State) - $10,271,250
Lincoln Riley (USC) - $10,040,000
James Franklin (Penn State) - $8,500,000
Curt Cignetti (Indiana) - $8,000,000 [very recent new contract]
Luke Fickell (Wisconsin) - $7,625,000
Jedd Fisch (Washington) - $7,500,000
Kirk Ferentz (Iowa) - $7,000,000
Dan Lanning (Oregon) - $6,624,999
Bret Bielema (Illinois) - $6,500,000
Jonathan Smith (Michigan State) - $6,000,000
PJ Fleck (Minnesota) - $6,000,000
Mike Locksley (Maryland) - $5,500,000
Matt Rhule (Nebraska) - $5,500,000
Greg Schiano (Rutgers) - $4,000,000
Ryan Walters (Purdue) - $4,000,000
DeShaun Foster (UCLA) - $3,000,000

You'll see a lot of casual fans online say stuff like, "Bret Bielema is paid almost as much as Dan Lanning?!" or stuff like that ... and it's like, dude, we HAVE to pay that much to get a great candidate and keep him, and we should be PROUD that the DIA has that kind of cash, not pinching its pennies that are not ours, haha.
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I look at this differently, This is Dan Laning’s first head coach job. Not sure if he got a raise this past offseason, but will probably get one after this year and put him closer to CC. bB right in the middle of the 5.5-7.5 group
 
#91      
pvaughn8
Illini2010-11 said:
The only thing you forgot to include would be hiring their kid for a position they were unqualified for, which helped keep the company from getting to profitability. Otherwise, I completely agree with the general premise.

The Lovie hire was outside the box (at a time we needed outside the box) and brought in a level of true professionalism that was absent of the program for ages. Ultimately it did not work out, but we are kidding ourselves if we think that Josh was going to be able to bring in a better hire than Lovie at the time he did (or the season later if he held off the hire). Not many (high quality) candidates would have lined up for the dumpster fire that Lovie inherited. The on-field results were not good, but my gosh did we step forward with heavy donations and upgrades to our facilities during that timeframe (all of which put us in a position to lure in Coach B). In addition, the Lovie hire helped to repair many of the PR issues that we had (did not cringe the coaches press conferences like the ones we had with his predecessors). Lovie deserves the scrutiny for the way he coached (and some of his coaching hires), but he also should get some credit for helping to repair the culture that was in the dumpster when he arrived.
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I just don't buy that hiring Lovie was a necessary precursor to hiring a Bret Bielema.

This whole notion gets brought up anytime someone makes a negative remark about the prior coach. If we must talk about the past, Lovie absolutely deserves to get !!!! on. If anything, all these remarks about raising funds, restoring respectability, etc. should be attributed to Josh
 
#92      
the juiceman cometh
pvaughn8 said:
I just don't buy that hiring Lovie was a necessary precursor to hiring a Bret Bielema.

This whole notion gets brought up anytime someone makes a negative remark about the prior coach. If we must talk about the past, Lovie absolutely deserves to get !!!! on. If anything, all these remarks about raising funds, restoring respectability, etc. should be attributed to Josh
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Yeah, it was a bad hire. I liked it at the time, and see where he was going with it, and obviously the move was made with the right intentions, but with the benefit of hindsight there were probably dozens of better options the team could have pursued. If I'm looking for a silver lining there, I like to think that JW learned a lot from that hire, not that the hire itself did anything to set the program up for success.
 
#93      
Illini2010-11
pvaughn8 said:
I just don't buy that hiring Lovie was a necessary precursor to hiring a Bret Bielema.

This whole notion gets brought up anytime someone makes a negative remark about the prior coach. If we must talk about the past, Lovie absolutely deserves to get !!!! on. If anything, all these remarks about raising funds, restoring respectability, etc. should be attributed to Josh
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If Josh goes out an hired another MAC coach, do we really believe all the funds were going to still magically appear? None of this happens in a vacuum. The Lovie hire was a true spark to the program (and showed to the donors and public/media that the program was serious about trying to win). Do you not remember the extended excitement that lasted months going into the 2016 season (all after a long period of scrutiny left by the prior administration both in public and media)? Sure it fizzled in the end, but you are naive if you believe that Josh would have been able to still pull in all the resources he did if he hired a Beckman 2.0. Was Lovie a bad coach for the program in terms of win/loss, yes. Did he provide needed stability to allow Josh to build out facilities and a positive culture, also yes. Could Josh have made a better initial hire, sure, but we are being naive to think that there was a large demand for the product known as Illinois football in 2016 from a coaching perspective.
 
#96      
IlliniRocketFan
pvaughn8 said:
I just don't buy that hiring Lovie was a necessary precursor to hiring a Bret Bielema.

This whole notion gets brought up anytime someone makes a negative remark about the prior coach. If we must talk about the past, Lovie absolutely deserves to get !!!! on. If anything, all these remarks about raising funds, restoring respectability, etc. should be attributed to Josh
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Who is the person that hired Lovie. All pieces of the puzzle did their job together. In the timeframe Josh had, who could he have realistically hired (available and willing to jump into the dumpster fire) that would have brought the attention to the program? Do you really think Bill Cubit would have had the same result in the big picture and gotten Illinois to the place we are now? I will go with "hell no"!!!
 
#97      
Bucktown
The Lovie hire was also such a big deal, because Josh had been hired only three weeks earlier. The university took a big risk hiring Josh because of his lack of experience at the D1 level. So, the Lovie hire boosted confidence in Josh which helped the entire DIA. You could make the argument that without Lovie, Illinois does not hire Underwood.
 
#98      
GoDucks349
Battle89 said:
Yup, that was my first thought, Dan Lanning deserves a raise. Second thought was $4M per win in West Lafayette...
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With the 10th win this season Lanning got a one year extension on his contract, plus a $100,000 bonus for winning 10 games. I believe his bonus for winning the 11th game was $200,000. I know he has lots more bonus money on the line with more wins this year. And yea I wouldn't be surprised if they adjust his compensation going forward.
 
#99      
Illini2010-11
GoDucks349 said:
With the 10th win this season Lanning got a one year extension on his contract, plus a $100,000 bonus for winning 10 games. I believe his bonus for winning the 11th game was $200,000. I know he has lots more bonus money on the line with more wins this year. And yea I wouldn't be surprised if they adjust his compensation going forward.
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Welcome back! Congrats on securing a berth in the B1G Championship game with 2 games left to play.
 
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