They were set to hire Kevin Sumlin in 2011 before A&M grabbed him. Fast forward to 2020, Sumlin and Illinois end up back on the market a day apart.

Not great. Three of the losses were to ranked teams, and Purdue was a close one. Minnesota was the only head scratcher, but they've been up and down all year. Lovie deserved better. I'm sure Frank will be here with a much more nuanced opinion, but this doesn't seem like a good move to me. It's Illinois and Lovie was an Illinois guy, and the locals actually were paying a little attention to them with an ex-Bears great at the helm.

(12-13-2020 03:38 PM)Mav Wrote:  Not great. Three of the losses were to ranked teams, and Purdue was a close one. Minnesota was the only head scratcher, but they've been up and down all year. Lovie deserved better. I'm sure Frank will be here with a much more nuanced opinion, but this doesn't seem like a good move to me. It's Illinois and Lovie was an Illinois guy, and the locals actually were paying a little attention to them with an ex-Bears great at the helm.

I agree with you. Illinois was shorthanded most of the season. Yesterday, 21 defensive players out including 6 starters. If Illinois got to play its 3 OOC games, they’d be .500.

Lovie was also building the program for the long haul and had one of the youngest teams in the country for majority of his tenure — the right way to build a program from the bottom-up.

I guess the old adage that patience is a virtue no longer applies. Illinois isn't a place where one should expect quick turnarounds. This is a long term rebuilding project, that isn't helped by interrupting the job every few years.

Get Malzahn.

I think this is a bad move. This is not a year for marginal programs to fire coaches for on-field performance reasons.

The Illini administration didn't learn anything new about Lovie's coaching ability this year. Firing him this year means they shoulda fired him last year but didn't have the guts to make the move.

And who are they gonna get that's better than Lovie? Matt Campbell and Luke Fickell are not going to Illinois. The "up and coming" options in the MAC this year aren't exactly overwhelming either.

(12-13-2020 05:35 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  I think this is a bad move. This is not a year for marginal programs to fire coaches for on-field performance reasons.

The Illini administration didn't learn anything new about Lovie's coaching ability this year. Firing him this year means they shoulda fired him last year but didn't have the guts to make the move.

And who are they gonna get that's better than Lovie? Matt Campbell and Luke Fickell are not going to Illinois. The "up and coming" options in the MAC this year aren't exactly overwhelming either.

The Buffalo coach?

(12-13-2020 05:45 PM)UTEPDallas Wrote:  

(12-13-2020 05:35 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  I think this is a bad move. This is not a year for marginal programs to fire coaches for on-field performance reasons.

The Illini administration didn't learn anything new about Lovie's coaching ability this year. Firing him this year means they shoulda fired him last year but didn't have the guts to make the move.

And who are they gonna get that's better than Lovie? Matt Campbell and Luke Fickell are not going to Illinois. The "up and coming" options in the MAC this year aren't exactly overwhelming either.

The Buffalo coach?

Between Buffalo and the success he had at Whitewater, it's a matter of time before he ends up in the Big Ten. I wish we could bring him aboard at Nebraska, but I don't think Frost is going anywhere for a couple years. He'd be a great get for the Illini, unless Michigan comes calling.

Look at Kansas if you want to see a history of firing coaches and/or decades of coaching turnover. You don’t want to be like Kansas is right now. And frustratingly, they’ve have had some pretty high peaks at multiple times in the last few decades.

As a Bears and Illini guy to the core, I sooooo badly wanted Lovie Smith to succeed at Illinois. If you recall, the Illinois program wasn’t just a dumpster fire on-the-field when they hired Lovie, but a dumpster fire off-the-field with the abusive Tim Beckman. Lovie is as high of a character coach as you can get in football and he was quite successful in the NFL.

However, the results simply haven’t been there and, more importantly, the canary in the coal mine of poor recruiting classes means that a future turnaround under this same regime wasn’t in the cards. I’m a bit surprised by some of the comments that this was somehow an impatient move. Lovie has coached 5 seasons (which is plenty of time for evaluation) and this was supposed to be the year where the team would show the most progress since they were bringing the vast majority of key starters back. While the pandemic scheduling certainly was a large obstacle on that front, the 2 other Big Ten teams that brought a similar number of starters back - Indiana and Northwestern (who have been even bigger doormats in football than Illinois historically) - are having banner years.

It’s actually quite shocking how poor the recruiting has been even for a program like Illinois. The thought that when Lovie was hired was that his notoriety in Chicago and reputation of developing players in the NFL would lead to a large recruiting boost. Instead, Illinois has somehow gotten *worse* in recruiting over the past 5 years. I think the world of Lovie as a defensive mastermind, but it has become clear over his tenure that he doesn’t have any real interest or aptitude for recruiting and that wasn’t turning around. We were heading toward another last in the Big Ten recruiting class.

I know that we may not be a program that can expect a magical turnaround, but at least middle-of-pack Big Ten football isn’t exactly an unreasonable expectation within 5 years of a coaching change. It might feel like eons ago, but this team still made a Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl in the 2000s. Lovie got half of a decade to reposition this program’s trajectory and it simply didn’t happen (and recruiting failures indicate that it will never happen). Believe me - there’s no one more pained about this than me. We’re starting over from square one yet again.

Lovie's last seven years as a head coach:

Tampa Bay
2014, 2-14
2015, 6-10

Illinois
2016, 3-9 (2-7)
2017, 2-10 (0-9)
2018, 4-8 (2-7)
2019, 6-7 (4-5)
2020, 2-5 (2-5)

That's good for a 25-63 record, including a 10-33 record within the B1G. Going back to his Bears tenure, yes, he made it to a Super Bowl, yes, he coached multiple All-Pro and potential HOF players in guys like Urlacher, Tillman, Briggs and Peppers. However, in nine years with the Bears, Lovie made the playoffs just three times. For all of the resentment that a coach like Marvin Lewis got at Cincinnati (zero playoff wins in 16 seasons), Lewis at least made the playoffs seven times. IMO, Lovie remains one of the most overrated head coaches at the professional or college level, especially by Bear fans. He is an outstanding defensive coach (he should be an NFL DC), but he repeatedly failed at every stop to have a sustainable winning team and struggled consistently with the offensive side of the ball (even at Illinois, his highest scoring offense at Illinois was ranked 79th in the country). He's a nice guy and coaches defense very well, but I chuckle whenever I hear "Lovie didn't get a fair shake" or "Lovie was an outstanding head coach". The Bears have been miserable since he left, yes, but he wasn't going to playoffs a lot anyways.

Illinois has struggled the past decade mainly due to the rise of Northwestern (and Pat Fitzgerald). IMO, I think it is very difficult for both Northwestern and Illinois to have solid seasons moving forward. That would mean that at least two other programs of Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota or Purdue need to have down seasons, and both programs need to steal wins from the top of the league). Very tough task. If Fitzgerald does get the Bears job (and possibly bringing in Lovie as his DC), Illinois - with the right hire - could get out of the bottom of the B1G West. There's no reason for them to have had a sustained losing program for so long. I'm excited to see what Whitman can do and who he can pull in - he has made two splash hires in Lovie and Underwood; I'm envisioning him making another name hire to help fuel support.

Fitzgerald coaching the Bears with Lovie as DC would be very interesting.

Lovie with the Rams was a perfect match - Greatest Show on Turf for offense to go along with his stout D. But as time went on the rest of the NFL adjusted to Tampa 2 and he couldn't get the offenses up to par where they needed.

I'm not sure who was on his staff at U of I, but for him to be successful in college he needed a sharp OC with some guys who could recruit great athletes; he didn't get that and here we are. I thought with their bowl last year they were on the way up but without OOC games it really revealed some holes in the program.

While a strong Northwestern impacts U of I more than other Big Ten teams, I don't think it makes it impossible to be competitive. They were spending five million a year on Lovie so it's not like they don't have some cash to throw at a good candidate.

(12-14-2020 01:38 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  As a Bears and Illini guy to the core, I sooooo badly wanted Lovie Smith to succeed at Illinois. If you recall, the Illinois program wasn’t just a dumpster fire on-the-field when they hired Lovie, but a dumpster fire off-the-field with the abusive Tim Beckman. Lovie is as high of a character coach as you can get in football and he was quite successful in the NFL.

However, the results simply haven’t been there and, more importantly, the canary in the coal mine of poor recruiting classes means that a future turnaround under this same regime wasn’t in the cards. I’m a bit surprised by some of the comments that this was somehow an impatient move. Lovie has coached 5 seasons (which is plenty of time for evaluation) and this was supposed to be the year where the team would show the most progress since they were bringing the vast majority of key starters back. While the pandemic scheduling certainly was a large obstacle on that front, the 2 other Big Ten teams that brought a similar number of starters back - Indiana and Northwestern (who have been even bigger doormats in football than Illinois historically) - are having banner years.

It’s actually quite shocking how poor the recruiting has been even for a program like Illinois. The thought that when Lovie was hired was that his notoriety in Chicago and reputation of developing players in the NFL would lead to a large recruiting boost. Instead, Illinois has somehow gotten *worse* in recruiting over the past 5 years. I think the world of Lovie as a defensive mastermind, but it has become clear over his tenure that he doesn’t have any real interest or aptitude for recruiting and that wasn’t turning around. We were heading toward another last in the Big Ten recruiting class.

I know that we may not be a program that can expect a magical turnaround, but at least middle-of-pack Big Ten football isn’t exactly an unreasonable expectation within 5 years of a coaching change. It might feel like eons ago, but this team still made a Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl in the 2000s. Lovie got half of a decade to reposition this program’s trajectory and it simply didn’t happen (and recruiting failures indicate that it will never happen). Believe me - there’s no one more pained about this than me. We’re starting over from square one yet again.

If the problem is fundamentally recruiting with a coach being terminated, add three or four years to the subpar string of W-L results to make another major assessment with the replacement coach. Agree, this is not frequently a good look. Hopefully, Lovie leaves enough promising recruits to shorten the re-building period if the new coach shows he is delivering.

And Bielema is hired.

Ouch, can’t believe they hired bielema, might be worse than miles at Kansas.

(12-17-2020 06:56 PM)OdinFrigg Wrote:  

(12-14-2020 01:38 AM)Frank the Tank Wrote:  As a Bears and Illini guy to the core, I sooooo badly wanted Lovie Smith to succeed at Illinois. If you recall, the Illinois program wasn’t just a dumpster fire on-the-field when they hired Lovie, but a dumpster fire off-the-field with the abusive Tim Beckman. Lovie is as high of a character coach as you can get in football and he was quite successful in the NFL.

However, the results simply haven’t been there and, more importantly, the canary in the coal mine of poor recruiting classes means that a future turnaround under this same regime wasn’t in the cards. I’m a bit surprised by some of the comments that this was somehow an impatient move. Lovie has coached 5 seasons (which is plenty of time for evaluation) and this was supposed to be the year where the team would show the most progress since they were bringing the vast majority of key starters back. While the pandemic scheduling certainly was a large obstacle on that front, the 2 other Big Ten teams that brought a similar number of starters back - Indiana and Northwestern (who have been even bigger doormats in football than Illinois historically) - are having banner years.

It’s actually quite shocking how poor the recruiting has been even for a program like Illinois. The thought that when Lovie was hired was that his notoriety in Chicago and reputation of developing players in the NFL would lead to a large recruiting boost. Instead, Illinois has somehow gotten *worse* in recruiting over the past 5 years. I think the world of Lovie as a defensive mastermind, but it has become clear over his tenure that he doesn’t have any real interest or aptitude for recruiting and that wasn’t turning around. We were heading toward another last in the Big Ten recruiting class.

I know that we may not be a program that can expect a magical turnaround, but at least middle-of-pack Big Ten football isn’t exactly an unreasonable expectation within 5 years of a coaching change. It might feel like eons ago, but this team still made a Sugar Bowl and Rose Bowl in the 2000s. Lovie got half of a decade to reposition this program’s trajectory and it simply didn’t happen (and recruiting failures indicate that it will never happen). Believe me - there’s no one more pained about this than me. We’re starting over from square one yet again.

If the problem is fundamentally recruiting with a coach being terminated, add three or four years to the subpar string of W-L results to make another major assessment with the replacement coach. Agree, this is not frequently a good look. Hopefully, Lovie leaves enough promising recruits to shorten the re-building period if the new coach shows he is delivering.

I don't know U of I's roster, but I doubt Lovie left much in the cupboard. Even bad NFL coaches are better at coaching the game than most college coaches, and Lovie was not a bad NFL coach.

His failure to meet U of I's expectations should therefore be attributed to a lack of recruiting.

I always thought it was a mistake for Bielema to leave the Midwest.

About as good a hire as Illinois could have made IMO. Proven winner in the B1G. A midwest guy. Smashmouth style of play, which will fit in with the division. And knows how to recruit (unlike Lovie, who could not have been more disinterested).

Many Illinois fans are already ridiculing the hire, bringing up his Arkansas record and saying he can't win without Alvarez's players. Arkansas is 7-27 since firing Bielema in the much more competitive SEC West, which he had several winning seasons. At Wisconsin, in years 5, 6 and 7, when he had his recruits and not Alvarez's, he went to three straight Rose Bowls.

Solid B+/A- hire.

Bielema to Illinois is not a bad move. At least Illinois is not in the B1G East Division where it’s harder to compete. If Minnesota can turn it around so can Illinois.