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Illinois Fighting Illini (you'll see)

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I have to be honest, I just don't see Illinois moving up into that elite realm. Their biggest asset is also their biggest weakness: Zook is a fantabulous recruiter, but a mediocre at best gameday coach. X's and O's are as important as Jim's and Joe's when you play against elite competition. As Penn State falls, Wisconsin has been very steady. They don't seem to have the stuff to overtake the big two, but I don't see Illinois readily passing them soon. Becoming their equals? Certainly. But don't think that Wisky will go away easily.

Minnesota is looking to rise, as are Dantonio's crew, but there is an ingrained culture of losing at Minnesota (and they lack top flight campus facilities for athletics). MSU could rise, and Dantonio is a great coach, but they're going to have to break M*ch*g*n's stranglehold on Michigan talent to do so. RR might give them a hand with that, but only time will tell.

Bottom line, to me, is this: unless Zook takes the Pete Carroll approach and becomes a glorified cheerleader who has an eye for talent, his teams won't consistently ascend to the top tier of play. Carroll isn't an incredible coach - he's OK, but not great. He does, however, have a great eye for coaching talent and has consistently found great assistant coaches to help develop the great player talent he can draw. It's a great system, and he seems to have identified his weaknesses and supplemented them with the strengths of others. Zook needs to look to do that, in my opinion.
 
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When you're done rolling your eyes, go watch the tape again. Illinois benefited from a combination of a defense that played soft coverage and allowed Juice to pick up 3-4 yards per play in the 4th quarter and some questionable officiating throughout the game. I won't say that the blown call on a fumble that led to a touchdown in a game with a 7 point spread was the reason we lost. It wasn't. It just didn't help at all.

You want to see how mediocre the Zooker can be? Watch the Iowa game. Or the USC game. His team came out of looked terrible in both of those games. Iowa was bad, bad, bad, bad, bad last year - and they beat Illinois. Illinois put up crazy yardage on USC, but it was ultimately pointless because they didn't have any semblance of a workable gameplan on offense or defense. Once USC realized that Juice can't throw very well and would run virtually every time he had the ball in in his hands, that was that. Mendenhall's yardage mostly came in garbage time (that is, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th quarter) and had nothing to do with Zook's magnificent game plan.

Until Zook beats somebody through a well crafted gameplan, I won't be convinced that he can take a team to the promised land.
 
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TheIronColonel;1156843; said:
When you're done rolling your eyes, go watch the tape again. Illinois benefited from a combination of a defense that played soft coverage and allowed Juice to pick up 3-4 yards per play in the 4th quarter and some questionable officiating throughout the game. I won't say that the blown call on a fumble that led to a touchdown in a game with a 7 point spread was the reason we lost. It wasn't. It just didn't help at all.

You want to see how mediocre the Zooker can be? Watch the Iowa game. Or the USC game. His team came out of looked terrible in both of those games. Iowa was bad, bad, bad, bad, bad last year - and they beat Illinois. Illinois put up crazy yardage on USC, but it was ultimately pointless because they didn't have any semblance of a workable gameplan on offense or defense. Once USC realized that Juice can't throw very well and would run virtually every time he had the ball in in his hands, that was that. Mendenhall's yardage mostly came in garbage time (that is, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th quarter) and had nothing to do with Zook's magnificent game plan.

Until Zook beats somebody through a well crafted gameplan, I won't be convinced that he can take a team to the promised land.
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AS many on here have pointed out, notably Gatorubet and the other SEC-ites, that is the Zooker's MO. His teams will be inconsistent, undisciplined and horrible some games, losing to teams they have no business losing to, but other games will come out and beat somebody ranked well ahead of them, looking very good.

In 2002:
-10/5/02 - #6 UF lost to unranked Ole Miss 17-14,
-10/12/02 - #16 UF lost to #18 LSU 36-7,
-11/2/02 - Unranked Florida defeats #5 UGA 20-13.

In 2003:
-10/4/03 - #24 UF loses to unranked Ole Miss 20-17,
-10/11/03 - Unranked UF defeats #6 LSU 19-7,

Beyond all that, it was just a well-executed game by the Illini. OSU was just unfortunate enough to run into the Illini on the day they played the best game of their season.
 
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I'd also point out and..(waits to here bernini's footsteps running this way) Wisconsin does seem to do an amazing job with less recruited talent. Perhaps the best in the big10, so recruiting rankings arent likely to scare them much. I do agree however that Zook will last longer as a thorn in the big10 than Kirk I love trev alberts Ferentz
 
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TheIronColonel;1156843; said:
When you're done rolling your eyes, go watch the tape again. Illinois benefited from a combination of a defense that played soft coverage and allowed Juice to pick up 3-4 yards per play in the 4th quarter and some questionable officiating throughout the game. I won't say that the blown call on a fumble that led to a touchdown in a game with a 7 point spread was the reason we lost. It wasn't. It just didn't help at all.
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IMO, the reason you lost was because of your defensive scheme. Early in the game, you played 8, sometimes 9 guys up, daring Juice's feeble arm to beat you. That left single coverage on 3 of the 4 passing touchdowns (and, on the Wilkins touchdown, one safety covering two receivers). Then, on the final drive, OSU inexplicably goes soft and drops back, allowing Juice the three 3rd-down runs. We had no business winning that game, but your defensive switch happened at just the right time.

Once USC realized that Juice can't throw very well and would run virtually every time he had the ball in in his hands, that was that. Mendenhall's yardage mostly came in garbage time (that is, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th quarter) and had nothing to do with Zook's magnificent game plan.
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Sounds great, except for the fact that Juice had more passing yards in the Rose Bowl than any other game in his career (245). 35 passing attempts = "run virtually every time he had the ball in his hands"?

And the bulk of Mendenhall's yards came in the third quarter when it was still a 21-10 game and, be it not for a Jacob Willis fumble at the USC 3, would have been a 21-17 game. We would have still lost the game as we could not stop their rushing attack, but as the USC fans seated behind me would tell you, the opening 8 minutes of the third quarter were hardly "garbage time".

I say now what I said when Zook was hired - I will not judge his in-game coaching until the final game of the 2009 season when I have a full body of work to review. He still has not coached a team dominated by upperclassmen. 2.5 years of starting many freshmen and sophomores at Florida, and now 3 years of doing mostly the same at Illinois. If he fails in 2009 with guys who have been playing in his system for 4-5 years, I will have issues. But until then, losses like the Iowa game can't be pinned on gameplanning. In fact, the Iowa loss can be directly tied to one thing: our go-ahead, 70-yard touchdown pass on the final drive that was called back because our receiver lined up incorrectly.
 
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We can talk all day about why we lost to Illinois, but the Mendenhall run, the time out for the punt, final interminable drive, this scheme, that scheme, and on and on are not the point.

Illinois was a serious dog in our house. The game should not have been close and we should have had enough talent differential to overcome every listed obstacle.

Ultimately you must give substantial credit for what happened to Ron Zook and his game plan and preparation and to some extent his recruiting and player development.
 
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I guess I'd be more willing to see the other side of this if it seemed like Zook's kids played consistently well (or poor, I guess). However, the Illinois team that lined up and beat OSU (in a great game, by the way) had little resemblance to the team that lost to Iowa. I honestly, seriously think that if Zook can get solid assistant coaches to help coordinate the offense and defense at game time, then we'd better watch our ass. Zook is a hell of a recruiter and can really get kids in the program. I'm just unconvinced of his X and O knowledge, on the whole. That's not a slam on him - he's making millions coaching a major college program and I'm not, so take it for what it's worth. I just happen to think that Illinois' success under Zook will be more dependent upon his considerable ability to assemble talent (both players and coaches) than his ability to scheme football games.
 
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Bucky Katt;1156856; said:
In 2002:
-10/5/02 - #6 UF lost to unranked Ole Miss 17-14,
-10/12/02 - #16 UF lost to #18 LSU 36-7,
-11/2/02 - Unranked Florida defeats #5 UGA 20-13.

In 2003:
-10/4/03 - #24 UF loses to unranked Ole Miss 20-17,
-10/11/03 - Unranked UF defeats #6 LSU 19-7,
Click to expand...

Add in 2007

Illinois loses at unranked Iowa
Illinois wins at #1 OSU


Concrete examples of what it means to get Zooked.

This is why he will eventually get run out of Illinois and anywhere else. he recruits enough talent to get the expectations sky high then more often than not his teams just puke all over themselves.

The annual upset eventually starts to reinforce the calls for his head, the game is held up as an example of what his talented group of players are capable of. The losses are on him and his staff.
 
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The talent gap is closing between Illinois and OSU.
Zook has his guys ready for big games.
What happened to our big game coaching?
Even if he Zooks up, he can ruin our year. That should give all of us pause.
Illinois, arguably has become the team to worry about for the next couple years.
 
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Taosman;1156963; said:
The talent gap is closing between Illinois and OSU.
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If by "closing" you mean not a universe apart like before, then yes. He's bringing in pretty good players, but we're still pulling in much better.
Zook has his guys ready for big games.
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Sometimes.
What happened to our big game coaching?
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I hate when I see this. What is the biggest game of the year? We're still winning that every year. The disaster in the desert was clearly on the coaches, but this years MNC was simply a case of being beaten by the better team that had a ton of senior leadership, not bad coaching. We snuck into that game a year ahead of when we should have.

Weren't many people calling the UW game a big game last year? I think you were at the head of the line saying we could lose that game. Yes, UW wound up falling apart, but that was a fantastically coached game. We systematically dismantled them. Wiscy? PSU? Are those not still big games?
Even if he Zooks up, he can ruin our year. That should give all of us pause.
Illinois, arguably has become the team to worry about for the next couple years.
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Absolutely he can, and it should. I'll never underestimate them again. But before we go crowning them as the next big thing, maybe we should see how they do this year after losing their best offensive weapon.
 
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Jaxbuck;1156939; said:
This is why he will eventually get run out of Illinois and anywhere else.
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Illinois isn't exactly Florida. They'll be ecstatic to go to back-to-back bowl games for once. I could possibly see a Glen Mason-like departure but I think the only way Zook gets run out of Illinois is if they stop going to bowl games.
 
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