Illini Football 2025

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#101      
IlliniInBuckeyeState
Fighter of the Nightman said:
@IlliniInBuckeyeState, I'm super excited to see what your sellout tracker looks like for the home opener and following home games this year! Our slow increase in attendance in the Bielema Era has been nothing short of awesome ... to think we would have drawn 44k for a late start on a Thursday night vs. Eastern Illinois for an unranked team last year is such an incredible change of affairs.

Here is our home attendance for early season non-conference opponents (excluding Power Five ones, which draw bigger crowds) over the last several years, starting with Lovie's first season:

--- Lovie is Hired ---
2016
48,644 vs. Murray State (clear Lovie excitement here!)
40,954 vs. Western Michigan

2017
42,505 vs. Ball State
41,923 vs. Western Kentucky

2018
31,898 vs. Kent State
39,252 vs. Western Illinois

2019
30,654 vs. Akron (I believe this represented a 3-decade low point for average attendance)
34,759 vs. Eastern Michigan

--- Bielema is Hired ---

2021
33,906 vs. UTSA

2022
37,832 vs. Wyoming
37,579 vs. Chattanooga (Thursday night)

2023
48,898 vs. Toledo
53,512 vs. FAU

2024
43,849 vs. Eastern Illinois (Thursday night)
51,498 vs. Central Michigan

FWIW, after the CMU game and win at Nebraska the following week, we never drew below 52k the rest of the year, including an average attendance of nearly 57k over those games and a second sellout of the season vs. Michigan.
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I’m excited too! But it’s too early for an update until single game tickets go on sale. Expect the first update sometime in July.

I was actually working on my ticket tracker workbook last week, rolling it over to 2025 and preparing to create a Google Sheet that can be viewed by everybody here. It really isn’t that profound, but based on the interest level here, I think several of you will enjoy exploring it.

A few of the features it will have:
- a summary of historical attendance and related metrics, as well as stats on my ticket tracking over the last 2+ seasons. Attendance figures will start with recent years, but it can be expanded farther back.
- a Memorial Stadium capacity tab which shows the counts of seats in every row, in every section of the stadium.
- detailed ticket availability pages for each game on the 2025 schedule showing current estimates of tickets sold/available.

If there are ideas for other features/information you might be interested to have included, please share here and I’ll see if it’s possible.
 
#104      
GrayGhost77
abchew2 said:
To save clicks Illinois is picked to finish 12th
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michael jordan laughing GIF
 
#110      
Mr. Tibbs
BalloonsTheElephant said:
I'm one that doesn't get crazy excited preseason so as to not be disappointed, but even 12th in the B1G is ridiculous on the fact alone that we have a very favorable schedule.
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its intentional disrespect

not only a favorable schedule, we were 10-3 last year and we have a 3rd year starting Sr QB , and 85% of the teams starters are returning.
an idiot would see we should be ranked at least in the top 5 in the conference
 
#113      
PleaseMakeABowlGame
Iamgroot said:
www.maizenbrew.com

Ranking the Top 5 edge rushers in the Big Ten for the 2025 football season

In a conference known for it’s defensive dominance, it’s no surprise that there’s a slew of edge rushers that are among the nation’s best. Here’s who we believe are the top five edge rushers in the Big Ten for the 2025 season:
www.maizenbrew.com www.maizenbrew.com
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surprised we haven't seen Jacas in more first round mocks. Very good combination of size, athleticism and versatility. 10+ sacks is very possibly on the table barring injuries.
 
#114      
AZILL
PleaseMakeABowlGame said:
surprised we haven't seen Jacas in more first round mocks. Very good combination of size, athleticism and versatility. 10+ sacks is very possibly on the table barring injuries.
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While he's been great for us, he's listed as only 4th best in the B1G in that article . No idea where that puts him Nationally, but 1st rounder is perhaps a stretch unless he has a monster season and leads the B1G in a couple of categories. A year over year progression including this upcoming season I think will put him late 1st round maybe? Let's play and find out!!!
 
#118      
SampsonRelpenk
gary? said:
honestly would take 8-4 (5-4 in big ten). i know 11-1 and 10-2 are being bandied about, but i just want back-to-back winning seasons and keep building.
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The team has a chance to do something really special this season, but the most likely outcome might very well be that we have a better team than 2024 with a worse record *ducks*.
 
#122      
the juiceman cometh
Mr. Tibbs said:
its intentional disrespect

not only a favorable schedule, we were 10-3 last year and we have a 3rd year starting Sr QB , and 85% of the teams starters are returning.
an idiot would see we should be ranked at least in the top 5 in the conference
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No it's not. If you read the article it's just ESPN's preseason FPI, which is a formula, kind of like KenPom or Torvik. Potentially a deeply flawed and completely irrelevant one, particularly at this point where not a single game has been played. It appears to be pretty much just where we finished in FPI last season (our FPI is way lower than our end of season ranking because FPI doesn't care so much about results as factors like points scored vs points given up - we didn't do great in it because a lot of our wins were close). The end result is that this is really just not a good way to predict anything. So it's dumb, but they didn't tweak the formula just to underrate Illinois or something.

And ESPN didn't like do a write up on it or anything, or even say this is what they expect the standings to be. The On3 article just literally links to the FPI page:

www.espn.com

2025 Big Ten College Football Power Index - ESPN

View the 2025 Big Ten conference College Football power index on ESPN. The FPI is the best predictor of a team's performance for the season.
www.espn.com www.espn.com


Edit: As an aside, ESPN humans are a lot more bullish on us than their computers. Adam Rittenberg has us at #17 in his Future Power Rankings, which attempts to project out program success for a longer period of time, in this instance through the end of the 2026 season.

www.espn.com

Future Power Rankings: How all 68 Power 4 college football teams stack up

Coaches, current roster, recruits: Who has the best overall team over the next two seasons?
www.espn.com www.espn.com
 
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#124      
mhuml32
Absolutely would sign up for an 8-4 season. That said, just going off the graphic of game-by-game expected results, Illinois being 4-4 going into the Rutgers home game would have some folks frothing at the mouth. Which would be a fair take! Also would hurt the PR narrative where Illinois goes 8-4 but never was a serious contender.
 
#125      
aaeismacgychel
Illwinsagain said:
If I am reading this right, I am not sure how we are projected as the #62 offense, with a 3rd year starter at QB, plus the rest of the offense returning.
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I believe the projected offense he has for us is 28th with defense 22nd and special teams 19th for a 26th overall under the 2025 projection. That said, if I recall correctly, KFord weighs prior season performance fairly heavily and we were 44th in offense last year so it is ripe for undervalue especially if our o line takes another leap.
 
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