A Spring and Summer to Remember (and Forget)
What an offseason! I started notes on this article many times over the summer, but then it seemed yet another story would come out of the woodwork. We sit one month before football season will begin and only a few days before Camp Rantoul. What has been missed since my last article — my season review which also included a Final Four preview? (Side note: it has been since the first days of April since I last wrote a piece. I have kept myself busy writing about the MLB for calltothebullpen.mlblogs.com — please check out my work there!). Let’s breakdown all the news this site has missed in the absence.
- May 22nd — Illinois Baseball wins their 27th game in a row, a Big Ten record for consecutive wins. The baseball team was captivating all spring, finishing just short of Omaha and the College World Series (mostly due to bad matchup luck, in MY opinion)
- June 2nd — Illinois Golf makes the Final Four, but also finishes just short. Not bad for a Midwest school playing two sports that are dominated by warm-weather schools.
- June 12th — Illinois Track has their first Top 10 national finish since 1988.
- June 18th-21st — U.S. Open, two Illinois alums — one recent grad, one freshman — provide excitement including Brian Campbell briefly leading the entire field for a span. Campbell finishes 27th overall and Nick Hardy finishes 52nd.
Not a bad spring for my beloved university. Domination in baseball, golf, and track — clearly what every U of I alum expects…wait, where are the “big” sports? I mean absolutely no disrespect to the Illini golf and baseball fans out there, but those aren’t exactly the moneymakers for the school. What have we missed in football and basketball news?
- April 8th — a few days after my last article, Mikey Dudek — one of, if not, the most exciting player on the football team tears his ACL.
- May 10th — Simon Cvijanoviç unleashes a barrage of tweets focusing on unfair treatment from the football program, including lying about injury reports and forcing hurt players on the field.
- May 18th — Seven women basketball players and their families come forward with allegations stating the coaching staff had used racism and general mistreatment.
- May basketball recruiting — miss out on fifth-year transfer point guard Dylan Ennis (5/6) and incoming freshman point guard Marcus Lovett (5/21), who was heavily recruited by Coach Groce’s staff.
- July 29th — Just a week ago, news broke that fifth-year senior Tracy Abrams tore his Achilles in practice after returning from a year-long recovery from a torn ACL leaving the team very weak at point guard (again).
Oh…that’s not nearly as fun. The two sports that most are primarily concerned with (three if including women’s basketball as a separate sport, which I personally have less concern) have not had much good news in the past four months. Sure, the men’s basketball team beat Kansas in a recruiting race (finally) with landing big man Mike Thorne, Jr and Malcolm Hill did get chosen to try out for Team USA. Overall, it hasn’t been a great 2015 for fourth year coaches Tim Beckman and John Groce. Can they recover the year this fall?
Get Casey Boguslaw’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
For the record, I did start this website due to my love of college basketball, but I am surely all things Orange and Blue. I will try to write a bit about football this season, time permitting. If anyone out there is interested in writing about football, all you have to do is ask.
With that said, college football is not my sport of choice but the Illini season has plenty of intrigue to cover. General consensus, at best, is confusion for the program. They had a good ending to last season and made a bowl (thankfully, remember that whole weird scare because of a Big Ten oddity?) Outside prognosticators do not have high hopes for the team but many writers familiar with the program have a bit more optimism. Dudek’s injury will certainly hurt, but as he is a superhuman, he may still actually play this season. Wes Lunt returns from injury to be the primary quarterback after posting good, not great, numbers in non-conference play. The defense almost has to improve, just by chance, but will certainly be counted on to keep a questionable offense in games.
As for the distractions, although there are still 30 days before the season starts, not much has been leaked whether the investigation, initiated by Cvijanoviç, will be completed before the season begins. With the investigation ongoing, it’s only natural to believe that press conferences will still be focused on that, rather than the play on the field. Faith in Beckman will certainly go a long way if he is able to navigate the team through controversy and lead them to a winning season.
Speaking of distraction, some more-good-than-bad news came out Monday that the women’s basketball coaching staff was mostly found to be incorrectly accused of racism and other mistreatment. Former assistant coach Divilbiss was found in the report to perhaps toe the line, but that is one of the many reasons he is now a former assistant coach. Women’s basketball is not my cup-of-tea but it still is a revenue creator for the university and many eyes will be on Coach Bollant to see if he can bounce back from a rough offseason.
As for John Groce’s squad, I’m at a loss. Some of the bad news over the years can be blamed on his personal efforts, but the man is so cursed that I’m sure he is a Cubs fan. I still want to believe that Groce can bring the Illini back to relevance, but the deck seems to be stacked against him. Not only is he out his senior leader again, but freshman phenom Jalen Coleman-Lands is also in a walking boot. JCL was supposed to be the extremely-appealing wildcard for this season but as the team heads to Europe next week, he won’t be able to lace ’em up. I will write up a preview piece as we get closer to the season but this season may really force Coach Groce’s flexibility. For the first time (I believe) in his coaching career, he will have more frontcourt depth than backcourt. His system has succeeded with guard play, but can he create something to take advantage of not only Thorne, but also unproven bigs such as Michael Finke and Darius Paul? The men’s basketball program has avoided the off-the-court distractions that the other money-making sports have, but the recruiting misses are piling up taller than Marcus LoVett. Not only does improvement need to be seen on the court (what happens to the coaching staff if they miss the tournament, even with the injury misfortunes?) but there also must be some recruit hits in the very near future.
If you’re an Illini baseball or golf super-fan, you’ve had a memorable 2015. As for me, and the majority of Illinois sports fans, the last four months will be an attempt to flip 2015 from a year to forget.
