Illinois Football Recruiting Thread

#76      
therealmiket86
Joel Goodson said:
that first OL class sucked, but should be viewed in the context of a perennial doormat. to a lesser extent, same with the second class

not easy to attract players that have good options when you're a doormat
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It’s not like I’m thinking they’ll land a bunch of 5 stars. The evaluations have been bad.
 
#77      
TampaToo
therealmiket86 said:
The issue is we haven’t been able to develop anyone. Maybe it’s from injuries but Crisler has regressed. Whitenack is not a big10 player. He is way too slow and stiff. He also hasn’t played since the Penn state game

Sims doesn’t a great job developing players on the dline. He just hasn’t been able to land the splash recruit. As of right now Miller hasn’t been able to recruit or develop.
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Time to move on from Miller?
 
#78      
Chukwuwumba
WeWillWhen said:
Henderson and Whitenack have played a bit, and they’re still young/behind upperclassmen; could be in regular rotation next season. Aamland has been hurt. Moller was always a dice roll. Okla and Fries obvious misses.

Staff has had better success with CC transfers, and I expect that will be a route they take again. Also expect they’ll look to spend significant NIL on a proven player (or two) from another P4 or G5 program, as they did this year.
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Isaiah Adams was a success. Crisler had one good year, with chase brown as RB though. I think that’s it.
I don’t expect staff will go juco unless someone top tier, but then lots of competition. Better players in the transfer portal but they will some sort of $.
 
#80      
mhuml32
therealmiket86 said:
2022
Magnus Moller
hunter whitenack
Matt fries
Joey okla
Clayton Leonard
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Fries and Okla already transferred. Whitenack (I was a fan) seems very likely to transfer after this season. Moller might as well. High likelihood of three career Illinois starts from this group (all Whitenack in '23). This is awful, and it's even worse realizing how Lovie's 2019 and 2020 offensive line classes were just as bad, meaning that playing time opportunities were plentiful with terrible on-roster talent and transfer portal was still in its infancy.

2023 is looking much better - Henderson likely makes 20+ career starts (if he stays healthy) and McMillen is getting universal praise as the heir apparent at center. My guess is he would immediately fill in if Kreutz goes down. Maybe he even pushes him for the job next fall?

2024 is very early but taking a peek: losing Dennis stings. Lots of early love for Hansen. TBD on everyone else (Stewart, Tuerk?, Francis). Would feel a lot better if staff snagged Brett Carroll, Will Nolan, or kept Dennis.
 
#85      
mhuml32
A man can dream...... one of the best offensive line coaches might be unemployed in December and could join a fellow ex-Hog in Champaign
 
#92      
CogDog
phats22 said:
"mene, mene, tekel, parsin"?
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I guess it depends on what is written on the wall. I think he inherited talent issues that coaching can’t fully mask and has been playing catch up since, but he’s had years now to help recruit and develop, so is he looking because he doesn’t want to fix what he was hired to fix? Bret’s messaging regarding Miller has led me to believe that he fully believes in Bart, but I’m not privy to what is going on behind the scenes.
 
#93      
illini0440
CogDog said:
I guess it depends on what is written on the wall. I think he inherited talent issues that coaching can’t fully mask and has been playing catch up since, but he’s had years now to help recruit and develop, so is he looking because he doesn’t want to fix what he was hired to fix? Bret’s messaging regarding Miller has led me to believe that he fully believes in Bart, but I’m not privy to what is going on behind the scenes.
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More so has to do with the current landscape of college athletics and how recruiting is.
 
#97      
TheDrinkinLincoln
therealmiket86 said:
We are running a lot of zone blocking but are recruiting maulers.
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Bret ran Zone Blocking at Wisconsin with a bunch of Maulers. Iowa has a big OL and runs a great deal of zone concepts. I don't think that dog hunts. Big OL can execute zone blocking concepts just fine. We're getting blown back into the backfield which doesn't work in any scheme.
 
#98      
therealmiket86
TheDrinkinLincoln said:
Bret ran Zone Blocking at Wisconsin with a bunch of Maulers. Iowa has a big OL and runs a great deal of zone concepts. I don't think that dog hunts. Big OL can execute zone blocking concepts just fine. We're getting blown back into the backfield which doesn't work in any scheme.
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Yeah but are we recruiting big ol that can move? Our run game improved immediately when we switched to gap blocking
 
#99      
TheDrinkinLincoln
therealmiket86 said:
Yeah but are we recruiting big ol that can move? Our run game improved immediately when we switched to gap blocking
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They're getting blown backwards which would be an issue in any scheme. I don't see them performing much better on power/gap blocking. Need better cohesion on double teams and backs to trust the OL and hit the hole harder. 2-3 is better than -2.
 
#100      
therealmiket86
TheDrinkinLincoln said:
They're getting blown backwards which would be an issue in any scheme. I don't see them performing much better on power/gap blocking. Need better cohesion on double teams and backs to trust the OL and hit the hole harder. 2-3 is better than -2.
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We have big linemen but they are very slow. That’s why I was never a fan of Whitenack. For being a developmental program it’s pretty scary this is our line in year 4.
 
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