Penn State 30, Illinois 13 Postgame

On the plus side, if we were going to have our poo poo turn over fest game, might as well have it come on the game that we had the least chance to win before the season.

On the minus side, Penn State wasn’t super sharp today and feel like if we hadn’t given them 5 TOS, the game was there for the taking.

Defense returned to form. Offense we ran the ball better. We need a deep threat in the worst way. Although not sure it would have mattered today as I don’t think we could give QB enough time to let a play develop. Elzy showed potential.

Overall I’m encouraged. 1-2 feels like holding serve through that schedule. Think there are still at least 5 more wins on the schedule.

Keisersose said:

I know it doesn’t matter right now, but Bret’s had some questionable decisions to got for 2 Pt conversions.

Take the extra point and make it 30-14 and it’s still a two possession game. You miss the 2 Pt try and it goes to 3 possessions. Not a huge difference between being down 15 or 16. But you don’t want to go down 17. I think he needlessly went for two against Toledo once as well.

Bret is supposed to be really good at details like that.

And I think we need a new QB coach and offensive coordinator.

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Really? I think it was more about giving the backups another live game rep to score from short yardage

Would like to see Feagin start next week in place of McCray (4 carries for -2 yards, absolutely abysmal), and let him know if he produces the job is his for the rest of the season. I think McCray is trying, but he is not even close to the tackle breaking, pile pushing runner he was as a freshman.

Nikethreadguysm said:

Did you watch paddock..?

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Yes. He was just warming up and at the end was good.

Our offense and defense are in conflict. BB wants to play ball control, physical football with a dominant defense. Lunney wants to go spread and not worry about time of possession. Our defense was completely gassed and put in horrible positions all game.
I was no TP fan; but at least he could figure out how to snap the ball under center....not completely out on Lunney, but they need to figure this out.

BWBW said:

I wonder if we might try to find another O coordinator in the off-season?

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You can’t be serious.

I'm going to go ahead and play armchair QB. If I was the coach today, this game would have been closer than 30-13 or we may have even won. They underutilized Reggie Love and of course Feagin. I would not have put McCray back in after the fumble. It's very easy to second guess things, but simply having the wrong personnel and some questionable play calls in certain circumstances has me a bit upset.

There needs to big changes now and massive changes when Oregon, UCLA, Washington, and USC come so we don't live the defintion of insanity.

illiram said:

Yes. He was just warming up and at the end was good.

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I did not see what you saw.

illiram said:

Play Feagin, Love and Paddock the whole game as a do-over and you never know....

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I do. It would be the same disaster play calling after abandoning the run...that once again started with success on the first drive.
This empty backfield RPO is putting too much pressure on Luke and Reggie....and the OL.

We need to get back to basics. Lunney is setting them up to fail.
Maybe it looks better after 4-5 games....but the way it's looking...that might be too late.


If Lunney is still the OC next year...I will retreat back into my basketball cave.

Keisersose said:

Eh. Like I said doesn’t matter now. But you don’t let it become a 3 score game any sooner than you need to! It was a bad decision.

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Analytically speaking it is better to go down 3 possessions earlier than later in terms of going for 2 pt conversions. Going for it there is the right time to do it.

Oh...insanity Bret? Ok.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. -Albert Einstein.

STLflyinIllini said:

Our offense and defense are in conflict. BB wants to play ball control, physical football with a dominant defense. Lunney wants to go spread and not worry about time of possession. Our defense was completely gassed and put in horrible positions all game.
I was no TP fan; but at least he could figure out how to snap the ball under center....not completely out on Lunney, but they need to figure this out.

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I agree with you completely except for one point....Lunney (or better a successor like a Sean Lewis) needs free reign. This halfway stuff will never work.

skyIdub said:

I do. It would be the same disaster play calling after abandoning the run...that once again started with success on the first drive.
This empty backfield RPO is putting too much pressure on Luke and Reggie....and the OL.

We need to get back to basics. Lunney is setting them up to fail.
Maybe it looks better after 4-5 games....but the way it's looking...that might be too late.


If Lunney is still the OC next year...I will retreat back into my basketball cave.

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Why did we abandon the run? If Lunney is not smart as an OC, should Bret not be stepping in?

For me it’s just disappointing to see how far away talent wise we are from Penn State. The game was over in the First half. Penn State pulled their starters in 3rd quarter and had mercy on Illinois

BWBW said:

I wonder if we might try to find another O coordinator in the off-season?

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The o coordinator didn’t throw 4 picks.

LJ22 said:

I did not see what you saw.

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Padlock = Matt Robinson. Smart, knows the game. Passionate. Great leader. Physically probably just doesn’t have the tools to consistently compete in the BIG. But can have success for a few series, particularly in a low leverage situation.

Pretty solid as a backup option but there is no QB controversy.

Well , that was not a highlight film take on our offense....In fact , when Luke was in , our offense was offensive.......I don't know what he was seeing on the field , but 3 of those INT's were just gift giveaways with NO CHANCE of being an Illini completion......

Now , he did get hit with a below the right knee tackle and favored his right knee for the rest of the time he was in....But , his worst game so far as an Illini , but it was a stinker all around for Luke......

Reggie Love bulldozed his way into the end zone for an impressive TD , but was absent for most of the remainder of the game.....
Elzy was impressive when in there and got his first Illini TD and deserves more playing time........
I liked what little I saw of Feagin......needs more touches and McCray less touches........
Wilcher had a good catch on the last play of the game ..........

Defense was the lone bright spot of the game and finally wore down after the inept Illini O and turnovers........Face it , we are never going to win a game with 5 turnovers against a quality opponent.....Johnny Newton is a load and will be playing for $$$ next year...
1st team All B$G this year also.........Clayton Bush led the team in tackles and I wasn't really that impressed with the touted psu QB1.....he was tentative and missed a lot of open receivers...........We kept their run game in check until their QB2 came in and ran it numerous times.........

We did improve on our penalty # 's...........

Waiting on BB for the post game interview............................................

Turnovers were insanity for us..................
Many things we got to improve on.................
Newton really showed up today....numerous tackles and blocked FG attempt.........
about our passing game .....On any pass 3 things can happen and 2 are bad (INT and incomplete pass).........
we got to see a lot of our depth players get on the field and played pretty good................
Feagin has one direction and that's forward...............
Elzy is a big time talent.......................

This game did NOT help my back pain and at times was boring as all get out , but it's the Fighting Illini and I'm a die hard fanatic so , let's learn from our mistakes and win next week to even the season at 2-2..........................

BTW , that non call on our 2 point conversion was absolutely TERRIBLE......

Time for some serious medding up , so adios amigos...........................

illinipimp said:

The o coordinator didn’t throw 4 picks.

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But he did abandon the run with 2 playmakers in Love and Feagin. How about some screens with them? There were 2 plays last year where everyone went one way and Chase went the other, and he scored on those screens. Where is that play??

I hate put the blame on Altmeyer because he's been good but those interceptions were pretty awful. Although it's frustrating to see them go away from the run so early but hard to blame Lunney when the QB keeps giving the ball away.

You cannot win when you turn it over 5 times.

The D looked ok but the qb play was terrible. Now we see why he could not win the Ole Miss job.

Would rather have seen Donovan Leary out there instead of the Ball St transfer. We need to develop our own qbs instead of relying in transfers.

blackdog said:

I hate put the blame on Altmeyer because he's been good but those interceptions were pretty awful. Although it's frustrating to see them go away from the run so early but hard to blame Lunney when the QB keeps giving the ball away.

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No, very easy to pin this one on Lunney. When you are at a certain income level, you need to be blamed, or let someone else accept that income level.

In regards to the offense how much is scheme and how much is personnel? That line is horrendous (and what does that say about our depth if this is the best they can trot out there every week?). Altmeyer frequently had no time to throw and when he did our WRs got no separation.
I'm not especially a BLJ fan but I wonder what his offense would look like with some better OL and skill position players. Also how much control does Lunney have? How many of Bret's fingers are in that pie?
Edit: Obviously today the Ints were the story of the offense, I was speaking more in general on the season.

Sedino said:

Analytically speaking it is better to go down 3 possessions earlier than later in terms of going for 2 pt conversions. Going for it there is the right time to do it.

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Man this makes no sense to me. I’m in the camp that you should never go for two until you have to go for two. Too many things can happen in a game so you just don’t know if you will regret giving up that one point.

But in this case if we had made it a 16 point game, the odds of getting the ball back twice and getting two 2-Pt conversions are still pretty low, but seems to me the odds of getting 3 scores are substantially lower.

Small aspect of this game but I don’t just don’t like going for 2 very often and I thought Bret was the kind of coach that was more conservative and valued points.

I think Luke needs a hug