Illinois isn't as bad of a job as many think it is.

Submitted by skatin@the_palace on December 15th, 2020 at 4:30 PM

With Lovie Smith getting the axe at Illinois and the first B1G job opening up this year, I've been thinking about what a good University of Illinois program could look like with the right man in charge. 

1. Illinois is in a great recruiting location. They intersect between Chicago (3rd largest), St. Louis (65th), Indianapolis (17th largest). All 3 of these cities are within 2.5 hours. Plus about 3.5 hours to Louisville and then they're about 5 hours away from Memphis and Nashville respectively. Now being close to major metros does not equal good talent acquisition, but they're positioned to get a number of hubs quickly and easily. 

In theory, they could be pulling quality guys from a core group of metros easily instead of having to travel farther away and pitch a kid on coming to Champaign, Illinois, they're selling D1, P5 football that's close to home. Mom and Dad aren't going to miss many home games. 

2. They're the only state school that is also a power 5. U of I is a great school but they'll have much more leeway than Northwestern when it comes to admitting students. When it comes to state schools, they're only competing with NIU for other talent at the D1 level outside of Northwestern. 

 

3. They have good facilities and community. They just opened a brand new facility in 2019. Champaign is a fun college town and the basketball program is nationally relevant again. 

 

4. It's a low stress job. What I mean by this is, the media hub for the state of Illinois is Chicago, which is a Bears town for football and also filled with other alumni from other B1G schools. They don't have the spotlight on them like Michigan, Nebraska, Minnesota, OSU, Wisconsin, and to a lesser extent Iowa and MSU do from playing in the states biggest city or its capital. 

 

Like I said, you can't win every recruiting battle for a state, but Illinois does not have one top 25 player from Illinois committed to them. The first Illinois recruit to make the list comes in at 26. 

It appears to me, that this could be a program that could easily be a 8-9 win team if you think about the logistics and geography of where it is. Guess they just need someone to get in there, lockdown their state and their nearby metros and they could be off to the races. 

To be honest with you all, if I'm Fickell, it seems easier to build my program, my way at Illinois than it was at MSU. There won't be the pressure of having to right the ship of a blue blood like he would at Michigan. He could basically do what he's done at Cincinnati because of his ties in the state of Ohio, work on developing the same model in the state of Illinois and he could be doing the same thing at UC at U of I. Kind of a scary thought.  I mean he did take the #5 recruit from Illinois last year (along with another top 30 player), 2 top 30 players this year, and 3 top 50s from 2019. 

Maybe we shouldn't shoot down Fickell to U of I so quickly. They've got geography, infrastructure, and time on their side. Could be the gig that allows him to put his mark on a P5, plus he's not in the same division as OSU which would probably be of some small consolation to him. 

Curious to hear what anyone else thinks of the sleeping giant that may be Illinois. 

Football

Comments

Newton Gimmick

December 15th, 2020 at 4:58 PM ^

They do seem like they have potential, especially now in the West, but they always make strange head coaching hires and have never had a consistent identity.  I think Leipold would be a great get for them.  If the Indiana job were to come open it would be an interesting question which job is better.  Obviously Indiana is in better shape as a team right now, but Illinois almost certainly has a higher ceiling given their location and division.

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Robbie Moore

December 16th, 2020 at 6:19 PM ^

Illinois football has been a mystery for decades. Wisconsin has been good. Iowa is OK to good. So what is Illinois' excuse? 

Hiring Leipold not be swinging for the fences. It would be a safe pick. Probably cheap too. If they were bold they would pony up for Matt Campbell. The path to winning at Illinois would look quite doable to the guy who resurrected Iowa State.

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mjv

December 15th, 2020 at 5:37 PM ^

While your points are accurate and it should be a decent job, the truth is that the Illinois job is terrible. 

The AD isn't committed to putting forth the resources to win.The state is struggling with insolvency and no one is willing to have the optics of spending resources on sports.  

Chicago is a better recruiting ground for ND and the other Big Ten schools.  It's 2 hours from Chicago to Champaign by car, so it isn't much closer than Iowa or Madison and its further away from ND.  

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blueheron

December 15th, 2020 at 6:13 PM ^

This (^^^^^) pretty much.

Every other metro area in the original post can be claimed more successfully by other teams that are at or above the current prestige level of Illinois:

  • Indy (Purdue, IU)
  • St. Louis (Missouri)
  • Louisville (Kentucky and -- obviously -- Louisville)
  • Memphis (UT, rest of SEC)
  • Nashville (another SEC town)

It has no town of its own. If it were in (say) Aurora the whole scene would be different. Even then it would have to fight off other Big Ten schools and ND would still probably get lots of RC kids.

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matty blue

December 16th, 2020 at 11:29 AM ^

well, yeah, those cities 'can' be claimed by those schools, but honestly, the first three aren't really lead-pipe cinches...maybe indianapolis is off the table, with purdue and indiana in stable situations.  but st louis is ripe, and my memory (i'm happy to be corrected) is that illinois has had some great players come from there.  you could do pretty well if you got the top players in st louis and chicago every year.

you didn't mention it, but milwaukee isn't barren of talent, either.  a good coach could go in and get some kids.

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Chaz_Smash

December 17th, 2020 at 12:42 AM ^

I grew up in Illinois and think location is the biggest detriment. It's a decent college town, but so far in the middle of nowhere it's practically invisible in Chicago. The primary state college shouldn't be 2+ hours from the population center.

On top of that, it has a long history of corruption and incompetence in the athletic department. The only good thing is they finally improved the facilities to catch up a little to the rest of the Big Ten.

They haven't been able to land an in-demand candidate since Mackovic.

 

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rob f

December 15th, 2020 at 8:58 PM ^

Why is this in diaries?

Because it's long, maybe?

I might get overruled on this, but since it's a pretty good discussion so far, and because I've found that it's impossible for me or LSA to move things from here over to the MGoBoard, I'm going to leave it up. 

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shoes

December 15th, 2020 at 7:17 PM ^

Chicago High School football hasn't been good in a long time, not sure why, it's possible that like NYC, many of the large H.S. can't afford football (facilities, equipment and insurance costs).

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canzior

December 16th, 2020 at 7:17 AM ^

It's not just that, but that's part of it. It's expensive to play football and average income for people with children within city limits is usually lower than that of the surrounding burbs.  Also because football is expensive a lot of cities don't have well funded or well coached youth leagues, so many kids don't actually play or learn anything about football until they get to middle school.  Another thing is location...in the south, it's warm all year, and kids go outside and play games and sports.  In Chicago, there's no playing football amongst 8 year olds in January. The cumulative effect is less time outdoors, less playing an organized version of football and less money to play and continue to play the sport.  It's why basketball is so popular in American cities...and soccer in many other countries around the world, because it's cheap for kids to find a goal and a ball and play often.

Joined: 05/28/2010

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Carpetbagger

December 16th, 2020 at 4:05 PM ^

Basically, football players in P5 schools don't come from poor schools anymore, and Chicago is full of those still. P5 football players come from schools where the kids have parents and schools that can afford to train them up from a young age, almost like semi-pro for kids.

The kids who played at Nebraska, USC, Florida State and such back in the 90s who couldn't spell cat if you spotted them the c and the t play for D1-AA, JUCO, MAC type teams now, or get "adopted" into a nice middle class family in the burbs. Progress of a sort.

Meanwhile, Chicago's school system hasn't evolved past the 90s like the states around them. Maybe it's too big; 3 million people live inside the city of Chicago. I'm not sure that many live inside the city limits of the rest of the list combined.

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1408

December 15th, 2020 at 10:25 PM ^

Fickell knows better than to head to Illinois.  He would be crazy to do so.  For many reasons, Illinois is absolutely the worst job in the Big Ten:

1. Memorial Stadium may be the worst stadium in the Big Ten.  That is an unfortunate fact because the history is tremendous but a fact none the less.  The other facilities might be nice but the stadium is truly awful.

2. Illinois is a basketball school.  Even moreso than MSU (a history of having good football teams with some tremendous teams every 5-10 years) and Indiana (which would be getting behind their football team in a big way but for Covid).  

3. Natural rival is unnatural.  There is nothing in common between Northwestern and Illinois.  It is a sad rivalry that few on either side really care about (both sides care far more about beating a team like Michigan, Notre Dame (if NU), etc.).

4. They have not even attempted to play meaningful non-con games.  Zero effort to go play top teams.

5. No natural fan base.  Chicago college football fans are far more interested in their respective alma maters or Notre Dame, in that order.  

6. Chicago is not a football hotbed.  Basketball is king in the City.  Some of the suburban schools are great at football but the top talent will always be more interested in going to Notre Dame or a top Big Ten school.  

7. Chicago also has closer proximity to better football programs (Notre Dame and Wisconsin).  

8. I don't know that a single coach has had 9 wins there more than once in 50 years.

I think the goal for Illinois is to become a pesky team that is known for doing something very well (e.g., hard nosed toughness on defense, running QB, etc.) and recruiting that way exclusively.  A coach like Mike Leach could probably do well at Illinois - you will need to be a system guy that can knock off a giant at least once a year and then probably also fumble four times against NIU.

If they were smart, they would do the Arkansas thing and play half their home schedule at Soldier Field.

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IDKaGoodName

December 17th, 2020 at 1:22 PM ^

Mike Leach suggestion is very spot on in my opinion. A coach like that would possibly bring some fans out of hiding for Illinois. Some seasons will be on par with what they are used to, but a coach like that could very well fall into an 8 or 9 win season, make it look fun with scoring a lot and stuffing the stat sheet, and recruit off of that. +1 for a good post

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DoubleB

December 16th, 2020 at 12:30 AM ^

Ah, Illinois and the potential of Chicago. There are certainly other reasons why Illinois isn't a great college football job. But there's always been a belief that if just someone could tap into Chicago from the flagship institution all would be solved.

But at some point, after myriad coaching changes, it isn't the coach, it's the situation. And the reality is that Chicago and Illinois south of I-80 are completely different from one another. And that's regardless of whether you're from Chicago proper or a town like Naperville. Completely different culture. The hope with Lovie was that he could tap into that area as the former coach of the Bears. Clearly didn't happen.

Illinois can certainly be better but this isn't some hidden diamond waiting for the right guy to turn it into Wisconsin.

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skatin@the_palace

December 16th, 2020 at 10:16 AM ^

I appreciate and love reading everyone's comments! However, I think some of you are missing the point. I'm not suggesting that overnight Illinois will be able to go into St. Louis or Indy and lock down after planting an orange and blue flag in the middle of the city. 

Instead, I'm suggesting that they could sell Illinois as a blank canvas to a coach that's currently above what we think the program is capable of. If they were to get the right person in charge, they're positioned to leverage some natural geographic advantages that could sustain a good football program. 

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mjv

December 16th, 2020 at 11:21 AM ^

The fallacy in your logic is that if someone was good enough to make a difference at Illinois, that they would stay at Illinois.  Illinois has never demonstrated that they were willing to spend the money required to achieve any level of success and are even less likely to spend the money to stay there. 

The examples for the unwillingness to achieve any success are the string of MAC level coaches (Lou Tepper, Tim Beckman, Bill Cubit) or retreads (Ron Turner, Ron Zook, Lovie Smith) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois_Fighting_Illini_football)

And when they finally did hire a quality coach who had a degree of success, they lost him to recruiting violations (Mike White) or to a more prestigious program (John Mackovic to Texas).

Per wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Mackovic):

"Following a year off, Mackovic resumed his coaching career when he was hired as the head football coach and athletic director at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 1988. Mackovic took over a team that went 3–7-1 before his arrival, but with whom Mackovic led to a 30–16–1, four straight bowl appearances, and a share of the 1990 Big Ten Conference title.

Mackovic's previous success of turning around college programs led him to the University of Texas in 1992. Texas had gone from a Southwest Conference title in 1990 to a 5–6 record in 1991. Mackovic won a share of the Southwest Conference title in 1994 and won it outright in 1995. He also won the inaugural Big 12 Championship Game in 1996."

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mjv

December 17th, 2020 at 9:44 AM ^

But the inkling of success at Illinois brings bigger players around looking to poach an up and coming coach.  For Illinois to have any lasting success, it needs to demonstrate that it is committed to putting up the resources to be successful for the long term.  

The nature of college football is that legacy programs with huge fan bases and traditions will generally gravitate towards the top of the ranking while have-nots much around below.  At what point does anyone think that Illinois was going to be able to compete with Texas to retain Mackovic?  MSU lost Saban to LSU.  Minnesota lost Holtz to ND.  UNC lost Brown to Texas. 

Again, the nature of the sport is for the legacy schools to poach the coaches of lesser schools.  Leaving the lesser programs to regroup and try to continue that success.

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jmblue

December 16th, 2020 at 10:36 AM ^

Just as how our program is hampered by the fact that OSU is a juggernaut, Illinois is hampered by Wisconsin, Iowa and particularly Notre Dame being good.   Making a breakthrough as a program isn't just about hiring the right coach (although that's certainly important) but also about having the right circumstances.

 

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Mpfnfu Ford

December 16th, 2020 at 2:57 PM ^

It's a horrible job, but if they'd just realize Illinois is a horrible job instead of thinking Chicagoland still produces enough football talent to feed anybody except Notre Dame, they'd do well. Hire Monken from Army, and make the Big 10 defend the triple.

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kalamazoo

December 16th, 2020 at 10:15 PM ^

I don't know why people love to beat this up so much. The guy just gave the starter business plan and any optimist would start there and develop it out.

So while it may or may not work, yes these are the positives.

Could it be a better program than Minnesota, Iowa, Purdue, and Indiana long-term? I don't think the odds are that crazy to say that it couldn't.

The best recruiters in the country could make it possible.

The coaching contract should probably be setup more as a "if you win 6 games you get 500K a year and go up 500K for each win from there", so a variable contract (probably not allowed but whatever, just spitballing here instead of poo-pooing the diary).

Then hire some batshit crazy high school coach who sees 500K is an absolute fortune and loves a good challenge, throw in a few "I'm a man! I'm 40" stunts and let's just see what happens. Insert 100 other strategies in addition, but it's possible, and I'll be interested in reading the biz plan 2.0.

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Flying Dutchman

December 17th, 2020 at 12:30 PM ^

Illini fans are utterly miserable, in their very own special unique way.    This applies to football and basketball in these 2 ways:

1)  When they are good, which is very rare, they act like they are a goddamn dynasty, like they are the only program that ever won a game in that sport.

2)   When they suck, which is most of the time, it's as if they don't have any fans at all.  

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Hail-Storm

December 17th, 2020 at 12:30 PM ^

I've always wondered why it wasn't a very good program.  It also has history to go along with being the only big State school in a big population.

I also think their colors and uniforms were cool.  They had some success at the end of the 90's with some mobile QB teams that were very good.  Seems like they should have had the success that purdue had with the basketball on grass era.

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