The Illinois football team has some serious wide receiver depth right now. The class of 2017 brought in some talented players to mix with the veterans.
Continuing to build the wide receiver core is going to be one of the keys to success in the future. There are some talented pass catchers still available for the class of 2018 as well. Some of these players are targeted by Lovie Smith and the Illinois coaching staff.
Khalil Shakir is the latest to emerge. He has the Illini in his sight and even named them as a top three school on his list right now. In an interview with Brandon Huffman of Scout.com, Shakir breaks down his recruitment and where he is as far as a commitment goes. He mentions Arizona State, Boise State and Illinois as the top three right now with the Broncos and Illini having the most contact with Shakir.
Shakir also says he likely won’t take any more unofficial visits and will just stick to his five official visits. He hasn’t scheduled any of those yet and a commitment date isn’t set-in-stone. But, from the sound of things, Illinois will likely get an official visit and they should be one of the final teams for his commitment.
Getting a player like Shakir would be huge for the Illinois football program. He would be another top 300 player for Lovie and the Illini. He is currently rated as a four-star recruit who is the No. 255 player in the class of 2018 and the No. 49 wide receiver in the nation. He also has nice size at 6-foot-1, 175-pounds.
Illinois has a nice stable of wide receivers right now. Malik Turner will be the only one departing after this season. That means Mike Dudek will be back next season along with the trio of freshmen from the class of 2017, Carmoni Green, Ricky Smalling and Kendall Smith.
All Illinois has to do now is find a quarterback who can get these talented wide receivers the ball. I am thinking the quarterback competition will be up in the air next season as well.
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Lovie has developed a nice stable of wide receivers and will hopefully add to it with bringing Shakir onboard. It is amazing how well this coaching staff has recruited. It is a complete turnaround from the previous regime and I can’t wait to see what type of class they can finish with in 2018.