Illinois comes in at No. 23 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings and with three losses remains a long shot to make the coveted Top 12.
Still, it’s coach Bret Bielema’s experience to never say never.
As they prepare for Saturday’s game against struggling Northwestern at Chicago’s Wrigley Field, the Fighting Illini (8-3, 5-3 Big Ten) carry optimism alongside their solid resume.
Two of Illinois’ losses came in road games to CFP No. 1 Oregon and No. 4 Penn State. The outlier? An eight-point home loss to bowl-eligible Minnesota to open November.
“What we’ve got to do is take care of Saturday, but the dialogue is out there and for that I respect,” Bielema said. “We, unfortunately, have three losses on the year, but it’s happened before. I did tell our guys when it happened, it was something still in the bag of tricks.”
Speaking of tricks, the Illini relied upon some savvy to shock host Rutgers 38-31 last week. Trailing 31-30 with 14 seconds left and zero timeouts and the ball on the Scarlet Knights’ 40, Illinois appeared primed to try to improve upon a potential go-ahead field goal. Moments earlier, a missed attempt was waved off by a Rutgers timeout.
Instead, receiver Pat Bryant rerouted after catching a pass from quarterback Luke Altmyer, spotted an opening and followed it to the end zone with just 4 seconds to go.
Altmyer was 12-for-26 through the air for 249 yards and two scores.
Outside linebacker Seth Coleman’s status for the game is uncertain after the sixth-year senior was injured in the fourth quarter at Rutgers.
Northwestern continues to fade, losing four of its past five games to likely tumble out of bowl eligibility. The Wildcats (4-7, 2-6) are coming off their most lopsided defeat of the season, 50-6 at Michigan last week.
Northwestern trailed just 10-6 after Luke Akers connected on field goals of 28 and 26 yards in the second quarter, but the Wolverines scored 40 unanswered points to close out the game.
“I’m excited for our team to bounce back after a tough Saturday,” Wildcats coach David Braun said. “The product that we put on that field is not us. We have to be better. … In our last guaranteed opportunity together, we have to send this team, this group, out the right way.”
Increased development from quarterback Jack Lausch figures to go a long way to that end. A sophomore who took over for transfer Mike Wright in mid-September, Lausch is a mere 31-for-56 for 307 yards and two interceptions in the past two games — against No. 2 Ohio State and at Michigan.
Northwestern allowed nine sacks of Lausch in those contests after yielding 12 in his first seven games.
“I’ll continue to be excited to be next to Jack as he continues to compete and put this team in situations to win games,” Braun said. “It can be really easy to point out issues at quarterback when the offense is not operating at the level you want it to. … But offensive success, it’s the beauty of football; it takes all 11 (players) to function at a high level to get results.”
