Photo Credit: Josh McCoy, Ole Miss Athletics
The Illini are in Hot Pursuit of Former Ole Miss Sophomore Quarterback Luke Altmyer, a talented gunslinger from Starkville, Mississippi who spent two seasons with the Rebels. On November 28th, 2022 Altmyer announced his intentions to enter the transfer portal. Shortly after, on December 18th, Altmyer took a visit to Champaign, along with another weekend visitor, recent Purdue commit Hudson Card.
It seems that the Illini were set on Card and Altmyer as two strong potentials to fill the Illini’s quarterback vacancy, before Hudson chose to take his talents to West Lafayette to play for former Illini DC Ryan Walters. Not an ideal situation for Illini fans who are already understandably frustrated with losing Linebackers coach Kevin Kane and Running-backs coach Cory Patterson to the Boilers. With turnover, these things happen.
With Card’s announcement to head to Purdue, this does however mean that the Illini are most definitely putting a lot of stock into the Sophomore from Starkville. It’s certainly not set in stone, but it is believed that there is mutual interest between the two parties.
With the departure of senior Illini quarterback Tommy Devito after the ReliaQuest Bowl, there is truly a great sell for Barry Lunney Jr. and Bret Bielema as to what Altmyer could develop into in this Illini offense. Devito had a really nice season during 2023 as a one-year transfer from Syracuse, and set a nice foundation for quarterbacks under Bret Bielema going forward. Devito finished the regular season with 2397 yards, 15 touchdowns and only 4 interceptions, making him the best quarterback for Illinois since Nathan Scheelhaase, who’s final season as an Illini was in 2013. Devito also led the Illini to an 8-4 regular season, and a trip to Tampa to compete in the ReliaQuest Bowl vs Mississippi State, Illinois most notable bowl since 2007. Why am I telling you all of this about Tommy? Because, you FINALLY have a selling point to top tier recruits like Luke Altmyer of recent success. This is a massive key in winning big recruiting battles to better your program, and create sustained success.
Why Altmyer?
Luke has not seen a ton of tick at Ole Miss, but what he has produced on the field has been a good product. Altmyer obviously has room to grow as he is a young sophomore, who has not played a ton, but he has a really high ceiling. A Former 4-Star recruit by ESPN, Luke was rated the No. 116 player in the nation on the ESPN 300 list. He was rated as the No. 11 overall Pro-Style quarterback in the nation, after he shockingly threw for over 3,000 yards his junior season of High School.
At Ole Miss, Luke was caught in a QB competition with former USC transfer Jaxson Dart, that continued into the third week of the season before the starting job was handed to the highly-touted transfer. In those three weeks Altmyer went 8-17 for 125 yards, 2 touchdowns and an interception. Not a bad or great start for the young quarterback, but again a ton of room to grow, with flashes of being a really good QB. A good example would be his entrance into the Sugar Bowl, where Altmyer had to take over for Senior Matt Corral as a freshman. Luke threw for 174 yards, had a deep passing touchdown, and threw 2 interceptions in the Rebels loss to Baylor. A tough showing for an, at the time, very young Altmyer who was seen as the next man up at Ole Miss.
Illini Now Kirk’s thoughts
I believe with the style of play Altmyer has as a Pro-Style quarterback, he would fit well into an offense that is really starting to build some weapons in the receiver room. If Illinois was a little better at taking the top off of the defense, it would be a really nice addition to the offense, who was really good offense overall, but you could say getting the ball down the field deep was a bit of a shaky area for Devito. As mentioned before, it seems that both parties are mutually interested, and with Hudson Card off the table, it only makes sense that the other top target be full court pressed. Depending on the crazy world of NIL and the transfer portal shuffle of course, you never know anything for sure, but I would say the Illini are in good for Altmyer and that there is a solid chance he could be in Orange and Blue. This would be a nice addition for the Illini short term to help grow young QB’s like Donovan Leary and Cal Swanson into potential starters who have grown in Barry Lunney Jr’s offensive system.
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