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Illinois Fighting Illini (you'll see)

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Illini Dylan said:
What I would give for that to happen :biggrin: But Purdue/Nebraska aren't gonna beat Wisconsin and Minnesota will wipe the floor with NW. Still fun to think about though. Would've had a better shot if we could've held on against Nebraska.
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Keep the faith stranger things have happened:

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Illini Dylan said:
I wonder how many times I've seen that game. BTN replayed it a ridiculous amount of times.
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I can pretty much guarantee you’ve watched that game more than any of us. Maybe more than all of us combined. :lol:
 
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Illini battling the Hawkeyes today. My heart says we can keep up the magic and pull another upset. But I think Iowa will win this by a 38-17ish kind of score.

While the epic Sparty comeback was great, we were still down 28-3 and 31-10 against a fading MSU team. Doesn't give me a whole lot of confidence we can steal this one. Plus Kinnick is always a bitch to play at.
 
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Illinois dropped $100,000 on billboards around St. Louis and Chicago

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College football has a lot of unique and quirky aspects to it but the infatuation with billboards has always been a notable byproduct of the sport over the years. While fans putting up messages regarding a specific coach or move an athletic department has made get plenty of attention, most of the time they’re just plain old advertisements designed to gain a foothold in a specific area for recruiting or messaging purposes.

The latest to go big in an attempt to get the attention of drivers on the highway? Look no further than surprisingly resurgent Illinois. While Chicago has often been a notable focus of the school’s advertising attempts in recent years, the Illini are expanding their reach and have put up some four billboards promoting the program around St. Louis this fall as part of an expanded, $100,000 initiative to boost athletics’ presence in the area.

Per the Champaign News-Gazette:

Athletics has rented four billboards in St. Louis and seven in Chicago this fall, from August through December. The cost for the five-month ad buy was about $100,000, Arner said.

DIA also buys billboards year-round in Champaign-Urbana worth about $53,000, she said.

The cost of each differs based on production costs and location, but it ranges from $1,600 to $2,600 a month, she said. The UI designs them and pays the companies to print and install them, on top of the monthly rental fees.

While a recruit is probably much more interested in the program reaching a bowl game for the first time under Lovie Smith than a few billboards, every little bit in recruiting tends to help and the ads no doubt help with things like ticket sales as well. The football program battles it out with numerous programs in both Chicago and St. Louis for prospects and have three players committed from the latter city as part of their upcoming 2020 class alone.

Entire article:
https://collegefootballtalk.nbcspor...00-on-billboards-around-st-louis-and-chicago/

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Sounding like the Redbox Bowl for my Illini.



My hope this year was a way to 6 wins and a bowl. Mission accomplished there, but that Northwestern game last week really pissed me off. I get that Peters and our top WR were out, but NU was down to their 4th string QB and we couldn't stop them. That really put quite a damper on the year in my opinion.

I can't tell if we're really getting much better, or if we were just a 4-8 team that got some insane turnover luck to steal a couple.

We return a bunch next year and getting some injured guys back that missed the whole season (running back Mike Epstein) (Linebacker Marquez Beason, our highest rated recruit in the 2019 class) will help. Hoping we can build on this year and jump to 8, perhaps 9 wins in 2020 if we get lucky but I am not holding my breath.
 
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Illini Dylan said:
I can't tell if we're really getting much better, or if we were just a 4-8 team that got some insane turnover luck to steal a couple.
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I guess you could say the wisc and sparty good/upset wins off got offset by the emu and northwestern bad losses. So probably a legit 6-6 team but very inconsistent.

Illini Dylan said:
We return a bunch next year and getting some injured guys back that missed the whole season (running back Mike Epstein) (Linebacker Marquez Beason, our highest rated recruit in the 2019 class) will help. Hoping we can build on this year and jump to 8, perhaps 9 wins in 2020 if we get lucky but I am not holding my breath.
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Sweeping non con games is gonna be important for all the b1g west teams next year. Purdue should rebound if they can avoid the injury demon, northwestern probably won't be this terrible again, nebby was about equal with illinois this year and Iowa, wisc, and minny probably aren't gonna drop off a ledge like the nerds did. Probably no real national contenders there but almost all of them can legitimately go into the season with indy as a goal. Cross over games with the east (avoiding osu/psu/tsun good, playing maryland/rutgers also good) could really matter for both division title and bowl eligibility.
 
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starBUCKS said:
Rittenberg/Bennett ‏@ESPN_BigTen


Find it humorous for a B1G Coach to switch to UC equal job? Actually had the chance to speak with Dick Butkus last weekend, and he had nothing good to say about Beckman, telling me how his nephew left the staff because of how much dislike he had for him. Said Beckman speaks a bunch about UM from the time he spent on his staff at BG. On the other hand told me he met Groce at the Spring Game and absolutely loved him, not s surprise.
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:slappy:
 
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Illini Dylan said:
Sounding like the Redbox Bowl for my Illini.



My hope this year was a way to 6 wins and a bowl. Mission accomplished there, but that Northwestern game last week really pissed me off. I get that Peters and our top WR were out, but NU was down to their 4th string QB and we couldn't stop them. That really put quite a damper on the year in my opinion.

I can't tell if we're really getting much better, or if we were just a 4-8 team that got some insane turnover luck to steal a couple.

We return a bunch next year and getting some injured guys back that missed the whole season (running back Mike Epstein) (Linebacker Marquez Beason, our highest rated recruit in the 2019 class) will help. Hoping we can build on this year and jump to 8, perhaps 9 wins in 2020 if we get lucky but I am not holding my breath.
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Yeah, but they think you are playing Cal State.....:lol:

Redbox Bowl does Cal, Illinois dirty with awkward errors on official T-shirts

At least both fanbases can agree that this shirt stinks

There are so many bowl games in college football that sometimes it's hard to keep track of who's matched up against who, what bowl they're playing in or where/when that bowl is being played. Accidentally mixing up certain bowl details is typically very understandable... unless you're the people in charge of said bowl.

That's why it was quite embarrassing to see the mistake made on the official T-shirts for the upcoming Redbox Bowl between Cal and Illinois -- or, if you ask the shirts, "Cal State" and Illinois.

Whoops!



For those still confused, like Redbox, Cal is not Cal State. They are completely different schools with their own students and campuses and everything. Only one of those schools is playing in the Redbox Bowl, and it's Cal -- otherwise known as the University of California, Berkeley or UC Berkeley. Not otherwise known as Cal State.
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The merchandise website has since removed the incorrect design but not before catching plenty of heat for the mistake. People have been so busy piling on the "Cal State" mistake that it's almost going unnoticed that they also used an outdated helmet design for Illinois on the same shirt. The helmet featuring the white "I" decal hasn't been used in two years. The Illini have primarily used a navy decal for the past two seasons.

Entire article: https://www.cbssports.com/college-f...rty-with-awkward-errors-on-official-t-shirts/
 
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Lovie Smith: Illinois has caught the rest of the Big Ten West

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Illinois is playing in their first bowl game in ages next week when they play Cal in the RedBox Bowl and that is quite the accomplishment for a program that has been the second-worst in the Big Ten this past decade.

Despite only just getting to .500 on the season in 2019 though, you will find nobody more optimistic about the state of the program than their head coach. Speaking to the Chicago Sun-Times, Lovie Smith appeared to be spreading some holiday cheer by claiming that the Illini had not only gotten out of the gutter, but that they’ve caught their Big Ten West rivals like Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa.

“We’ve caught them,” Smith told the paper. “Now, it’s about us competing. We’re not running from what our record was the last decade. Illinois had been down a long period of time. But as far as catching teams in our division that have traditionally been very good, we feel like we’re there now. We plan on beating everyone and eventually being the champion of this league.”

Well, you have to admire his confidence at least. Maybe not too surprising given how impressive Smith’s beard is but also a bit head-scratching all the same given that the program has been above only lowly Rutgers in the conference pecking order for so many years now and sit at just 6-6 going into their bowl game.

There’s momentum in Champaign to be sure but the leap from six wins to a division title and competing with the big boys like the Badgers is needless to say a bit much from Lovie and company. We’ll find out next year if the team can indeed make the jump but, for now, we’ll just have to sit back and admire one of the more bold calls coming out of the Midwest to close out the 2010’s.

Entire article: https://collegefootballtalk.nbcspor...nois-has-caught-the-rest-of-the-big-ten-west/
 
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Buckeye86 said:
:lol:

Good job keeping a low profile next year. It’s not like your limited success stems largely from other teams treating you like a bye week. Nothing could go wrong with talking shit and encouraging other teams to beat your extremely overmatched team’s ass by actually focusing on you for the first time in a decade.
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OSU may drop 40+pts... in the 1st half... in Urbana Champagne
 
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WTF...

Illinois Student Government results released Monday

Students also voted 4,222 to 3,597 in favor of adopting the orange and blue belted kingfisher as a University of Illinois mascot. The non-binding resolution will be presented to University administration to indicate student support for a new school mascot.

Entire article: https://dailyillini.com/news/2020/03/09/illinois-student-government-results-released-monday/

A similar vote was held last year for a mascot named Alma Otter, but that was defeated by a vote of 3,807 to 3,510.....:slappy:

https://news.sportslogos.net/2020/03/10/illinois-students-vote-in-favor-of-belted-kingfisher-mascot/





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