Gopher Football
Illinois Backfield vs. Minnesota Linebackers
The Illinois backfield has been a bit of a mess the last few games. Just this week, Illini coach Ron Turner announced that 6th year senior Jon Beutjer was being benched in favor of”¦. well, just about anybody except him. Illinois could start one of three other QB’s Saturday against Minnesota. The candidates are freshman Brad Bower, sophomore Chris Pazan, or former Gopher recruit Tim Brasic. The decision on who will actually be the starter may not have even be made yet. Turner commented that he will go with whichever quarterback he feels can go out and get the job done, so whichever one of them showed Turner the most this week during practice will get the nod tomorrow. Unless the starting quarterback comes out on a tear, expect to see at least two, or possibly three different quarterbacks for Illinois.
Over at the running back spot Illinois has dealt with a little bit of injury problems, but like Minnesota they have depth in the backfield and the backup has filled in nicely. The star of the Illini backfield coming into this year was sophomore EB Halsey. Halsey’s story is somewhat similar to Laurence Maroney, though without the gaudy stats. Halsey didn’t produce much at first last year, but really turned it on as the season progressed and was expected to be one of the best backs in the Big Ten this year. So far this season Halsey is second for Illinois in rushing with 403 yards on 84 carries. EB has been banged up the last few games though, so that has allowed another sophomore, Pierre Thomas to get a bulk of the carries. Thomas leads the team in rushing with 592 yards on 89 carries. No matter who starts and who gets the carries, the Illini should have a guy that can produce. Illinois also makes good use of their fullback, junior Jason Davis. Despite playing at a position that doesn’t normally produce very much, Davis has already accumulated 205 yards with 2 TD’s on the ground, and a team leading 28 catches for 236 yards and 2 TD’s.
For the Minnesota linebackers, this will be a bit of a ‘starting over’ game. The last two weeks the veteran Gopher linebackers have gotten torched to the tune of 1150 yards, many of them coming from inexperienced quarterbacks and inexperienced running backs. After having a nice start to the year, the linebackers have looked lost the last two weeks, and that’s why this is a big game for them. Illinois does have a couple of good running backs, but the mess at quarterback for them will give the Gopher trio a shot to straighten things out. With one senior and two juniors starting for the Gophers, the team needs them to step up and play like the veterans they are.
Advantage: Even
Illinois Receivers vs. Minnesota Secondary
The Illinois wide receivers are largely a group of unknowns. Their leading returning receiver from a year ago, Kelvin Hayden, was switched to defense because of desperate needs on that side of the ball. With Hayden out, the Illini have been led this year by Kendrick Jones. The 6’2″ junior came into this season with only one career catch, but so far this year he has grabbed 27 catches for 456 yards and one TD. The leading returning receiver (besides Hayden) for Illinois this year was Mark Kornfeld, but so far this year the senior has only 9 catches for 113 yards. Illinois doesn’t have a lot of star power in the WR corps, but they do have some decent depth.
The second Gopher defensive unit to have major problems last week was the defensive backs. If they weren’t missing tackles on receivers, they were missing tackles in run support. So far this season tackling hasn’t been a real huge problem, in fact, it’s been rather good. But in parts of the Michigan game and then especially against Michigan State, the tackling really got bad and allowed what should have been short gains turn into long ones instead. So, that is issue #1 for Minnesota this week. As far as pass coverage goes, the Gopher secondary should have a good day. The motivation should be there after a horrible performance last week, and the jumbled up quarterback situation for Illinois should make their receivers a little less effective and only help the Gopher D-backs out.
Advantage: Even
Illinois Offensive Line vs. Minnesota Defensive Line
The good play of the Illini offensive line so far this year is a big difference from how the season started off for them. Illinois returned 4 of their 5 starters from a year ago, but in the first game of 2004 they lost Bryan Koch for the year with a severe knee injury. Koch was a senior returning starter and one of the best linemen Illinois had. Replacing Koch at guard is their prize recruit of the 2003 class, redshirt freshman Martin O’Donnell. Along with O’Donnell, the rest of the Illinois offensive line has done a nice job this year, leading the way to the 3rd best team rushing average in the conference. This group has also done a good job protecting their quarterback. Through 7 games, Illinois is only allowing 1.9 sacks per game.
Minnesota’s defensive line is in a desperate search for an identity right now. In 2003 one of the major weaknesses for the team was the pass rush. During the offseason, moves were made in an attempt to make this area better, but so far it has not helped. Since there is no pass rush to speak of, the line could at least take some pride in the fact that they were doing a good job stopping the run. But in the last few weeks even the run defense has begun to suffer. The single biggest problem for the Gophers running ‘D’ is that they are getting beat bad when team run at them right up the middle. It’s been a problem all season, but in the last two weeks we’ve really seen Michigan and Michigan State exploit this. If there is any good news for the defensive line, it is probably their outside rushing defense. The increase in speed along the defensive front (especially with Anthony Montgomery and Darrell Reid moving to end) has made the Gophers a much faster lateral team. But, other teams aren’t stupid and they’re not really wasting a lot of time running outside right now. Minnesota really needs to have Montgomery and Mark Losli do a better job of causing havoc in the middle if the run defense is to improve. If they can do this, they will force teams to become more one dimensional with the pass. Make team one dimensional, and that usually means an easier job on defense.
Advantage: Illinois
Overall Advantage
When you look at Illinois, the first thing that sticks out at you is the 12 straight Big Ten losses that date back to 2002. But if you dig a little deeper, you’ll see that they aren’t all that bad on the offensive side of the ball. To date in Big Ten play:
– vs. Purdue: 30 points and 390 yards
– at Wisconsin: 7 points and 206 yards
– at Michigan State: 25 points and 378 yards
– vs. Michigan: 19 points and 254 yards
Those numbers might seen low at first, but understand that Illinois has already played (arguably) the top 3 defenses in the conference. They struggled somewhat against Michigan and Wisconsin, lit up Purdue in an impressive performance, and put more yards and points up on Michigan State than Minnesota did. If you’re a Gopher fan looking for something to worry about, that’s it right there. When I heard that Ron Turner was benching Jon Beutjer this week, I was surprised. If there is a team in the Big Ten that has been good at mending other quarterbacks, it’s Minnesota. If Beutjer were playing in this game I think that Illinois would stand a better shot. But with the three youngsters battling it out I don’t see it as a sure thing.
I said this in my Michigan preview and I’ll say it again for this one: If Minnesota wants to be successful defensively this week, their first priority MUST be to put pressure on the Illinois quarterback. They didn’t do this against Michigan, and Chad Henne went for over 300 yards on them and got into a comfort zone. Task #1 for Minnesota this week should be to NOT allow the Illinois QB, whoever that may be, to get into a comfort zone. This game is homecoming, it is in a loud domed stadium, and there will be a young inexperienced quarterback for Illinois. Get in his face early, and stay in his face throughout the game. If this happens, Minnesota will win in a blowout. If this does not happen, Minnesota’s defense will not be good enough to slow down the Illini attack, and once again Minnesota’s offense will have to come through.
Overall Advantage: Illinois
Special Teams Notes
Relatively speaking, the best player on the Illinois roster is probably their punter, junior Steve Weatherford. For the season, Weatherford has punted 27 times for a whopping average of 45.3 yards per kick. This is good enough to rank 2nd in the Big Ten and 8th in the NCAA. Weatherford also acts as Illinois long FG kicker and kickoff man. On 37 kickoffs, he’s had 12 touchbacks. Their regular kicker, Jason Reda is 7-10 on FG’s. In the return & coverage game, Illinois ranks last in the Big Ten in punt returns, and is in the middle of the pack in other categories. Minnesota’s return games are struggling this year. The punt return team is doing a good job in allowing only 2.3 yards per return, but the rest of the special teams units are all in the bottom four of the conference. Kicker Rhys Lloyd seems to have settled down after an erratic couple of weeks.
Advantage: Illinois
Prediction: Minnesota 37, Illinois 28
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