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I get the feeling that Lovie is just playing out the string in beautiful Rantoul .11, but the key is that we will have largely wrapped up Illinois by the time Lovie gets going.
I get the feeling that Lovie is just playing out the string in beautiful Rantoul .
He has offered over 100 kids for 2018, but does not seem that great at closing the deal. He really seems to be striking out in Illinois. Recruits don't seem to be buying what he is selling.
He had a few good gets in 2017. I think that brand is really tarnished thanks to Mr. Lasagna. NU is especially adept at early strikes. With high stakes this year in IL, it is hurting Lovie to be up against us.He has offered over 100 kids for 2018, but does not seem that great at closing the deal. He really seems to be striking out in Illinois. Recruits don't seem to be buying what he is selling.
He had a few good gets in 2017. I think that brand is really tarnished thanks to Mr. Lasagna. NU is especially adept at early strikes. With high stakes this year in IL, it is hurting Lovie to be up against us.
Wow, those are really sad pictures. What was their average attendance? and relative to stadium size?Yes, and maybe this too.....
I just answered my own question and lets just say we should delete this thread as we have nothing to crow about either in average total or percent of capacity for the last two years.Wow, those are really sad pictures. What was their average attendance? and relative to stadium size?
The answer was 8. He got a commit this morning from a QB from Peoria.
The answer was 8. He got a commit this morning from a QB from Peoria.
Yeah. That's not a bad tape at all. Arm strength is certainly there.Just a long release.Over Illinois State and Miami-Hydroxide. The kid's tape is decent (definitely raw, but solid physical skills) so have to wonder why he wasn't getting any more recruiting traction. Any ideas @corbi296 ?
Over Illinois State and Miami-Hydroxide. The kid's tape is decent (definitely raw, but solid physical skills) so have to wonder why he wasn't getting any more recruiting traction. Any ideas @corbi296 ?
But we have 9 as of Sat.The answer was 8. He got a commit this morning from a QB from Peoria.
He has been in the pros too long. QBs who are in the pros are often not the ones most successful in college. Dual threat is more needed in college, especially when you do not have the rest of the teamMy best guess is that he is late riser. He really came on during last season's state playoff run and most of his highlights are from those games. Hadn't done much prior to that.
Illinois should have gone after Re-Al Mitchell big time because he could have started for them Day 1. That kid is going to make someone a very good QB and right it looks like our old friend Louis Ayeni and Iowa State are in the driver's seat. For some reason Illinois did not offer even though they extended a lot of offers to dual threat QBs. Just reinforces that Lovie really has no clue what he is doing, particularly on offense.
My best guess is that he is late riser. He really came on during last season's state playoff run and most of his highlights are from those games. Hadn't done much prior to that.
Illinois should have gone after Re-Al Mitchell big time because he could have started for them Day 1. That kid is going to make someone a very good QB and right it looks like our old friend Louis Ayeni and Iowa State are in the driver's seat. For some reason Illinois did not offer even though they extended a lot of offers to dual threat QBs. Just reinforces that Lovie really has no clue what he is doing, particularly on offense.
He has been in the pros too long. QBs who are in the pros are often not the ones most successful in college. Dual threat is more needed in college, especially when you do not have the rest of the team
Because he didn't go after a QB from California? While I happen to agree that Lovie is unlikely to right the ship at Illinois in any meaningful way, it's a bit of a stretch to use Re-Al Mitchell as an example.
For what it's worth, Illinois seems to be going after bigger, athletic QBs (Taylor, Dwayne Lawson as a transfer, Cameron Thomas). That's pretty much par for the course for McGee's preferred QBs.
They extended 10 QB offers for this class and they are from all over. While Mitchell may not have the size they covet, I have no doubt he will be a very successful starting dual threat QB in college. Given that Mitchell appears to have strong interest in ISU, I have no doubt he would have considered Illinois had they offered. A mistake on their part.
I'm surprised that Lovie's start has been so flat at Illinois. I guess that is because he was just about the only thing I liked about the Bears for a while there. Not counting Sherick and Wootten and a couple of other short timers from NU.
That's a lot of certainty. I agree that Mitchell looks very solid on tape against some of the better competition in the country and the intangibles seem to be there, but the list of unsuccessful 5-10 QBs is much longer than the list of successful 5-10 QBs.
Don't disagree but it's not like the guy that committed and some others they offered were sure things. These guys are much more athlete than QBs right now. Mitchell is very polished relatively speaking. He actually reminds me of a more polished version of former Illinois QB Nate Scheelhaase.
Yet Scheelhaase measured 6014 at his Pro Day...
http://www.nfldraftscout.com/ratings/dsprofile.php?pyid=89768&draftyear=2014&genpos=QB
Are we so short-sighted that we have forgotten that it wasn't until 2 years ago that we started pulling in kids before April? For the most part, Fitz recruits started coming in after the spring game. It has taken more than ten years to build the network and system to name to get the early commits. And the program at Illinois has to get some success and stability before they start pulling in early classes. Lovie is doing the right thing. His staff is looking for the needles in the haystack. The recruits with good alternatives are not going to run to their door. Illinois will settle for some late bloomers, some under-the-radar, some over achievers, and a few core die-hards. Don't underestimate them because those are the kids who play hard. That school have beaten us enough times in the past ten years to never think of them as anything but a dangerous adversary.
The trend of early commitments is a system wide trend across college football that has been exacerbated over the last couple of years. A couple of years ago we got most of our commitments starting in April/May but so did most of college football. That timeframe has accelerated by a couple of months across most of college football and the fact that Lovie and Illinois have not participated in that trend is a troubling sign for them. Lovie was brought in with the idea that his NFL background would have an immediate star power impact on recruiting and translate into a quick turnaround on the field. The reality is that college football is way different than the pros and Lovie compounded a difficult transition by hiring a staff of people close to him as opposed to proven coaches who could develop talent and had experience in recruiting. The first year yielded very few signs of improvement on the field and recruiting has been a complete disaster so far reflecting the inexperience of the staff and the fact that most kids that are being recruited were too little to have any memory of Lovie Smith in his Chicago Bears Super Bowl heyday. The reality is that things are likely to get worse this fall because they graduated a lot of top contributors and the depth chart looks extremely weak from the poor recruiting that took place in the last couple of years of the Beckman regime. I think Illinois is in trouble and it would not surprise if Lovie walks away from this monumental challenge after next season.
In other words, when Illinois kids aren't buying what Lovie and Illinois are selling ... the window of opportunity closes very quickly. Barnett squeezed through only because he won Big in his 3rd year. That's Lovie's challenge and the measure of how long he has before the window closes. Right now, the handwriting on the wall is not promising.
GOUNUII
The trend of early commitments is a system wide trend across college football that has been exacerbated over the last couple of years. A couple of years ago we got most of our commitments starting in April/May but so did most of college football. That timeframe has accelerated by a couple of months across most of college football and the fact that Lovie and Illinois have not participated in that trend is a troubling sign for them. Lovie was brought in with the idea that his NFL background would have an immediate star power impact on recruiting and translate into a quick turnaround on the field. The reality is that college football is way different than the pros and Lovie compounded a difficult transition by hiring a staff of people close to him as opposed to proven coaches who could develop talent and had experience in recruiting. The first year yielded very few signs of improvement on the field and recruiting has been a complete disaster so far reflecting the inexperience of the staff and the fact that most kids that are being recruited were too little to have any memory of Lovie Smith in his Chicago Bears Super Bowl heyday. The reality is that things are likely to get worse this fall because they graduated a lot of top contributors and the depth chart looks extremely weak from the poor recruiting that took place in the last couple of years of the Beckman regime. I think Illinois is in trouble and it would not surprise if Lovie walks away from this monumental challenge after next season.
I hope we take the opportunity to drive them into irrelevancy. Because that is our next step IMO. Not that I hate Illinois, I really don't. But if NU wants to be consistently at the top of the heap, NU has to consistently hold other teams beneath them. We talk a lot about being competitive with the big guys like OSU but we have to dominate the bottom feeders in many aspects so that when we are recruiting head to head it will look like this year.
NU has to build a reputation of superiority. It is really a shame we lost to them twice in BB because I think the reputation, especially locally, is contagious.
A sad sack Illinois football is bad for us. We want IL high school kids excited about playing football for NU against a competitive Illini team. We want Illinois to be competitive with bowl aspirations before we thwart them late in the season.
Josh Whitman is not dumb like Mike Thomas. He will be patient with Lovie. He will not chase a lasagna quick fix. He won't tolerate clowns at Illinois athletics.
Don't think I've ever heard a kid say "I picked NU because I get to play against Illinois." I'm perfectly fine kicking the crap out of a bad Illinois program every year.
Actually having Illinois at or near the bottom of the conference is good for NU. Hopefully they stay there along with Rutgers, Purdue and Indiana. next NU needs to start winning consistently against Minnesota, Io-a, Wisconsin and Nebraska. next up should be MSU, Maryland and Pen St.. Then there is Michigan and OSU. Also I don't think Lovie and his wife will be around Champaign for long and it won't be Whitman's choice.A sad sack Illinois football is bad for us. We want IL high school kids excited about playing football for NU against a competitive Illini team. We want Illinois to be competitive with bowl aspirations before we thwart them late in the season.
Josh Whitman is not dumb like Mike Thomas. He will be patient with Lovie. He will not chase a lasagna quick fix. He won't tolerate clowns at Illinois athletics.