Wisconsin 25, Illinois 21 Postgame

DeonThomas · Oct 24, 2023

IlliniRunIn07 said:
A couple days removed from the game, I have to say that the energy of the crowd, the weather, and the play of the team (for 3Q at least) made for a very enjoyable afternoon. When I bought tix, it wasn’t hard for me to imagine a 40 degree rainy afternoon where we get blown out by 30+. Hell, I expected that. I want to say I couldn’t have asked for a better game but I am greedy and feel cheated out of a win.

There are so many saying “definitely targeting” and so many others saying “definitely not.” At worst, that’s a 50/50 bang bang call with zero malicious intent. For it to cost us 30 yards (not even counting the sack yardage and potential fumble recovery) plus losing our best player for the rest of this game and first half of next game for making a football play is on another level of ridiculous I can’t even fathom. It’s a short season and our best player is going to miss 3 quarters because Wisconsin could do LITERALLY NOTHING to contain him. If they called unnecessary roughness and left it at 15 yards and that was it I would probably be mad but not for days. And for those saying that we need to be able to overcome calls like that, why? We are Illinois football and need as much help as we can get. What questionable calls did the Badgers have to overcome? Ya know, since they have been head and shoulders better than us for 2+ decades and were on the road during our homecoming. Not saying any of those things should factor into us getting favorable calls but it seems to factor in for just about every other team.

We can blame the coaches and that’s fair. We can blame player execution in several plays and that’s fair too. It just felt like we we were far and away the better team on Saturday and just had about everything to wrong in the 4th (much of it our doing) and still only lost by 4 with 30 seconds to go.

In spite of that rant, what a memorable Saturday it was and I’m glad I was able to attend. Also I’m very proud of the team (players and coaches) for how they’ve responded the past two weeks after the season looked dead in the water. Yeah, wins matter, but I hope the team is taking some time to pat themselves on the back for the progress they’ve made this month. Good job, guys. Hope they can take the next step which will be consistently turning good performances into victories, and not just the moral kind.

Ditto.

I was also at the game in-person.

Gorgeous weather. Outstanding day for tailgating. Great friendships renewed. (Met some folks/classmates I had not seen in 20-30 years.) And it was a really, really fun and entertaining football game for 58 minutes!

LouDou · Oct 24, 2023

Illini in Italy said:
View attachment 28603

What part of what I said is wrong?

Locke got monster trucked...but not targeted.

cubsanddonuts · Oct 24, 2023

GILL-INOIS said:
No doubt the DL was thin before the ejection. Not being able able to make in game adjustments and a make a stop without him is absurd. I get it if we are playing an offensive juggernaut, but playing at home against a first time starting QB where they played conservative majority of the game blows my mind.

3rd and goal TD play the defense wasn't within 10 yards of the receiver.

3rd and 10 Wisconsin trying to land 1st down with 2 downs. Caught Illinois off guard with 11 yard run for 1st down

Might be skewed but D wasn't prepared for either play with him on/off the field

GILL-INOIS said:

No doubt the DL was thin before the ejection. Not being able able to make in game adjustments and a make a stop without him is absurd. I get it if we are playing an offensive juggernaut, but playing at home against a first time starting QB where they played conservative majority of the game blows my mind.

3rd and goal TD play the defense wasn't within 10 yards of the receiver.

3rd and 10 Wisconsin trying to land 1st down with 2 downs. Caught Illinois off guard with 11 yard run for 1st down

Might be skewed but D wasn't prepared for either play with him on/off the field

Click to expand...

It was frustrating to be sure. But to assume that the plays would have played out the same whether he was in there or not is, in my opinion, absurd.

MDchicago · Nov 2, 2023

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1719847224308388325

Great video by Robert, and agree with his takeaway about the shadiness of Luke Fickel.

Illini in Italy · Nov 2, 2023

MDchicago said:
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1719847224308388325

Great video by Robert, and agree with his takeaway about the shadiness of Luke Fickel.

Nah, I think the point is a little whiny. An eligible receiver wearing an eligible number was left uncovered on an unbalanced line, and our defense didn't analyze that and respond accordingly. The result? Game winning TD.

The question as to whether Wisky cheated by not having reported a change in the number is weak - the rules states that a "player enters the game after changing their number they shall report to the referee". The language is ambiguous - when does a team member become a "player"? Robert would argue that it would be in warm ups for the game, I would argue that it is when a team member enters the game, meaning that in this case the player never changed his number as he started the game wearing #93, so no foul, just a defensive lapse.

Of larger impact to me was the fact that if the defensive staff saw this prior to the snap, but we had no time outs remaining due to officials errors. . .

BZuppke · Nov 2, 2023

Why would the number be changed?

MDchicago · Nov 2, 2023

Illini in Italy said:
Nah, I think the point is a little whiny. An eligible receiver wearing an eligible number was left uncovered on an unbalanced line, and our defense didn't analyze that and respond accordingly. The result? Game winning TD.

The question as to whether Wisky cheated by not having reported a change in the number is weak - the rules states that a "player enters the game after changing their number they shall report to the referee". The language is ambiguous - when does a team member become a "player"? Robert would argue that it would be in warm ups for the game, I would argue that it is when a team member enters the game, meaning that in this case the player never changed his number as he started the game wearing #93, so no foul, just a defensive lapse.

Of larger impact to me was the fact that if the defensive staff saw this prior to the snap, but we had no time outs remaining due to officials errors. . .

So perfectly fine for a coach, without notice to the officials or opposition, to have listed uniform numbers swapped by different players multiple times a game as long as neither player has been in the game?? Agree to disagree, as that seems well within the definition of unsportsmanlike conduct to me (which is the penalty the rule calls for). I'm more interested in finding out which team is best at playing football than that type of nonsense.

To be fair to Robert, lack of timeouts due to errors by the officials was also a key point of the video, and not sure what more he could have done at the beginning of the video to make clear that its purpose was to explain Bret's comments.

Illini in Italy · Nov 2, 2023

MDchicago said:
So perfectly fine for a coach, without notice to the officials or opposition, to have listed uniform numbers swapped by different players multiple times a game as long as neither player has been in the game?? Agree to disagree, as that seems well within the definition of unsportsmanlike conduct to me (which is the penalty the rule calls for). I'm more interested in finding out which team is best at playing football than that type of nonsense.

To be fair to Robert, lack of timeouts due to errors by the officials was also a key point of the video, and not sure what more he could have done at the beginning of the video to make clear that its purpose was to explain Bret's comments.

Agree 100% with both you and Robert.

As to the number thing, I agree that it was kinda as*hat of Fickel to do that, but it doesn't break the rule. They didn't have any players change numbers "during the course of the game", they had one player change their jersey before the game started.

MDchicago · Nov 2, 2023

BZuppke said:
Why would the number be changed?

On offense, numbers 50-79 are ineligible receivers by rule. Wisconsin had the lineman who went on to score the game winning touchdown switch from 66 listed on their roster and which he wore in warm-ups to 93 without notifying the officials (and by extension, Illinois coaches), and took actions that had the effect of helping conceal the change (surrounding 93 in the pre-play sideline and having a couple of men in motion surround him prior to the snap). Near-impossible to detect in real-time when your opponent has no timeouts left to react.

MDchicago · Nov 2, 2023

Illini in Italy said:
Agree 100% with both you and Robert.

As to the number thing, I agree that it was kinda as*hat of Fickel to do that, but it doesn't break the rule. They didn't have any players change numbers "during the course of the game", they had one player change their jersey before the game started.

Perhaps I'm wrong, but I thought coaches had to provide the official scorer with a list of eligible players and their numbers before the start of the game. If so, would think changes to that information is what is what should trigger the notice required by the rule.

Illini in Italy · Nov 2, 2023

MDchicago said:
Perhaps I'm wrong, but I thought coaches had to provide the official scorer with a list of eligible players and their numbers before the start of the game. If so, would think changes to that information is what is what should trigger the notice required by the rule.

Agree . . . goes back to my statement about the language being ambiguous. A first year law student at a Dagestanian law school could spend a month punching holes in that language, which is why I think nothing will come of it.

Point-Illinois · Nov 2, 2023

Illini in Italy said:
Agree . . . goes back to my statement about the language being ambiguous. A first year law student at a Dagestanian law school could spend a month punching holes in that language, which is why I think nothing will come of it.

I’m guessing something will come if it, but it’ll just be another rule change at our expense.

Take away the ambiguous nature of the rule.

Instead, simply make it “If a player changes his number away from what is on the official roster submitted (to the head official before either team starts warmups), that player must report it before entering the game.”

Or something like that.

Now enforcing it on the other hand…