As the Illini ready themselves for a Friday Night border battle against the Indiana Hoosiers, they find themselves in a unique situation; that could potentially give them an edge. According to ESPN.com, the Illini currently sit as a 3-point underdog to the Hoosiers, who will be opening their college football season at home in Bloomington, Indiana. The Hoosiers are led by Tom Allen, who enters his 5th season as Head Coach for the Hoosiers, holding a 26-32 overall record as Head Coach.
The uniqueness of this game is true, and comes from many different angles. Indiana will be opening their season against a Big Ten rival in Illinois, which presents obstacles for the Hoosiers. Typically, Power 5 programs will play a Group of 5 or FCS program at the beginning of their schedule, to help them work out some rust, gain experience, and get momentum driving forward into conference play. This will not be the case for the Hoosiers, who are coming off a 2-10 season, with zero conference wins in the Big Ten only a short year ago.
The other part of this very odd situation is the fact that Head Coach Bret Bielema’s squad has already played a game in Week Zero and has a nice win under their belt. Why is this important, you may ask? Rust. There’s a lot of time that goes on between the end of football season, and the August season openers we are approaching. This will of course create rust, in team chemistry, that can be typically cleaned up after getting a game or two under your belt. There is a reason Illinois let Wyoming hang around 17-6 for most of the first half of last week’s game. Penalties, missed assignments, dropped passes, allowed Wyoming to hang close. They were working out some kinks. Once they did, they found fire in the offense and finished with 38 points and nearly 500 yards of offensive production. This could give the Illini a nice edge in Friday’s matchup, if they can pick up where they left off.
Know the Hoosiers
The big question will be, how much rust will Indiana have to avoid to stay even with an Illinois team that is feeling pretty good after their 36-8-week zero victory over the Wyoming Cowboys. The idea for Indiana would be to have some long-gained establishment from last season’s team, and hope to take a maturing step forward this year. Unfortunately for the Hoosiers, they currently rank 87th in the nation in returning production, bringing back only 57% of last year’s team.
The Hoosiers also brought in a new Offensive coordinator in Walt Bell, former U-Mass Head Coach, who was 2-23 in his 2-year Head Coaching career. This could present a very big opportunity for Ryan Walters’ defense, who knows that Indiana will have learned a new offense, and will be putting it to action for the first time, against the Fighting Illini. I expect Walters to try and put lots of pressure on whichever quarterback Indiana is to be named starter and capitalize on some of the early season miscommunications.
The Hoosiers are currently looking to find their man at Quarterback, and it will be a decision of whether to go to the old, or to the new. The old is Jack Tuttle, an off and on starter for the Indiana offense, who only appeared in six games last season, and started only twice. During this stretch, Tuttle went 45-87 passing, with 2 touchdowns, and 5 interceptions. Indiana looked to add a potential starter to this room, and added Missouri transfer Conner Bazelak. He was brought into the program via the Transfer Portal, and is also looking to earn a fresh start in Bloomington. Bazelak was the 2020 Co-Freshman of the year, as voted upon by SEC coaches. He certainly adds talent and depth to this room, the question will be will he be able to mold into a Walt Bell offense quick enough, and with little enough mistakes to beat another Big Ten opponent in his first start after Transferring?
Keys to Winning
Continue to win the trenches on both sides of the Ball. Bart Millers offensive Line Unit did an impressive job against Wyoming‘s defensive front last week. Chayse Brown was able to run free like a madman against the Cowboys, racking up 3 Touchdowns on 151 yards rushing. Tommy DeVito had this to say about his offensive line as well following Wyoming, “I’m not taking any shots here, I think this is the first game that I’ve been in where I did not get sacked. They did an awesome job.” As for Terrance Jamison’s Defensive line, they were able to get tons of pressure on a young Andrew Peasley from all positions. Keith Randolph and Johnny Newton dominated the interior, leaving the middle a wasteland to run into. If this continues, this Indiana team, who lost its top 4 producers on the running game, will be in trouble. Pressure from the Defensive front on a young, or inexperienced Quarterback, can cause fatal to an offense trying to get a foundation.
Continue to grow the passing game. Tommy DeVito went 27-37 in his first start for Illinois, with two touchdowns passing. This is one of the most consistent passing games we have seen from Illinois in quite some time, even though there were not many passes past 10 yards to move the chains. The quick game is going to be Very important for Illinois, which will also help take some pressure off star RB Chayse Brown, but Illinois will continue to need to grow the passing game down the field. It’s not a secret Illinois is going to be good at running the ball. Many believe that last week showed Illinois can be good in the quick game as well. But can they be deadly down the field? This could not only determine a lot for this Illinois offense over the course of the season, but the outcome of Fridays Nights game as well. I think Illinois will try to get more involved in the passing game down the field this week, as the playbooks opens more.
Capitalize on week one mistakes, likely a week 2 football team. Momentum is not something that can be let go of, especially in the pursuit of a bowl season for the Fighting Illini. After a dominant thrashing of Wyoming, Illinois must keep the petals turning, and continue to minimize the mistakes. Illinois was able to remain turnover free against Wyoming, with a low amount of penalties, especially in the second half. If they can continue this trend, while also being able to capitalize on the mistakes the Hoosiers make that any week one team would. This may consist of penalties, turnovers, shanked punts, and all of the other sure to happen mistakes that come along with not playing live football against another opponent in months. Credit to Josh Whitman, Illinois Athletics Director and Illinois Head Coach Bret Bielema for putting Illinois in this position with witty scheduling.
My prediction is that Illinois will be able to capitalize on the mistakes the Hoosiers will surely make, playing their first week of football in the 2022 season. Once again, credit to the athletic department for putting Illinois in this position. I believe the Illinois defense will be able to take advantage of a young, lack luster offense, Illinois should be able to continue winning the running game, I’d be serviceable enough passing to get the job done.
Kirkland Prediction: 27-17 Illinois
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