Illinois @ Minnesota - What we learned

While sitting on my sunny perch in Section 219 last Saturday, I realized that in all the game scenarios that ran thru in my mind, I did not process the one where the Illini go into the half up 21 with Juice Williams watching from the sidelines. Yikes. What the hell happened?

For starters, 'Bad Web' wandered back onto campus again, and like he has in games early in this season, it took him a half to really even get warmed up. In fact it was not until 13:40 left in the 3rd quarter before Weber was able to complete consecutive pass attempts. Worse than this though was the 6 points he gift wrapped for the Illini, on a pass that everyone in the stadium gasped at before it even left Weber's hand. His pick-6 to Terry Hawthorne might have been his worst INT of the season, and that's saying something.

But 'Bad Web' is only part of the story. The O-line didn't do him any favors either, as Weber was sacked an unacceptable 7 times. Coming off what I believed was their best pass blocking performance of the year last week, the line as a group regressed again. And their run blocking? Well its hard to say, since Jed Fisch decided that running the ball was not a priority in the first half. I don't usually like to specifically criticize playcalling because its very safe to assume that offensive coordinators at the college level know a hell of a lot more than me. However, I'll make an exception this week - as I feel that the 1st half playcalling was a big reason we couldn't go punch-for-punch with Illinois. Instead of running the ball we decided play-action passes to receivers 30+ yards down field were the way to go. These led to a lot of drive killing incompletions, and often forced us into too many 3rd and longs. By the opening drive of the second half, Fisch seemed to figure out the balance of run-pass, until he had the whole stadium groaning on a play-action pass called on a 2nd and goal from the half yard line. The play resulted in an 8-yard loss (QB sack), and the drive disappointingly ended with a field goal. From that down and distance, a TD seemed imminent, provided we keep handing the ball off to Hoese or Bennett inside the 5. Even working in QB sneak would have been fine. But enough second guessing. By and large, the offense stunk for a variety of reasons, and had Nick Tow-Arnett not come up with some clutch 3rd and long catches (including an absolute beauty down the seam), the mounting 4th quarter near-comeback would not have been a reality.

Assessing the defense is not pleasant either. They gave up 21 first half points, but they made adjustments and held them to just 7 in the 2nd half. Unfortunately, the last Illini TD scored came with 5 minutes left in the 4th, on a long, clock-eating drive. Jason Ford did well running against our front 7, and in the end managed to run the clock out on us. Our secondary was beaten by a freshman back-up QB (Charest), and got exposed repeatedly on 3rd downs when the front 4 couldn't get pressure. It almost seemed like they had gameplanned for Juice so heavily, that when he came out due to injury, they didn't know how to handle a traditional drop-back passer. After the Penn State and OSU games were over, I felt like our defense performed admirably, given their time on the field. But after the this game, I felt like they underperformed in a big way, and arguably gave their worst performance of the season. No major blown coverage in the secondary though, so I suppose that is one positive.

To both the offense and defense's credit, they did keep the penalties down (3 for 22 yards), so it was good to see the Brewster had tightened up on this over the week. Hats off to Keanon Cooper this week too, as he came up with the blocked punt that gave us a chance late in the game. That kid has had a nose for the ball all season, and good things happen when he's on the field (remember the pass breakup late in the game vs. MSU?) - really looking forward to his tenure as an everyday LB.

So what did we learn this week? Well, I discovered that sunny November football games at 'the Bank' will produce a pronounced thermocline down the middle of the stadium, with the fans on the southern half of the bowl kept nice and frigid under the shadow cast by the press box and suites, while the rest of us basked in solar warmth. We learned that we can play relatively penalty football. We learned that play-action passes don't work too well when you don't establish a running game, and they work even less well on the half-yard line when the run blitz is coming. And finally, I learned that fine friends, beautiful weather, and a Surly Furious make losing a football game in November tolerable. Win or lose, it was an absolutely picturesque day to go to 'the Bank'.

Jackrabbits from South Dakota State coming in this weekend, and I'll be there in person again to close out the home schedule. Stay tuned for the SDSU game preview tomorrow.