Illinois Football: 4 reasons why the Illini are losing games

2. Are we playing the right players?

I don’t mind Lovie playing all of these freshmen because that will build up their experience and ultimately help the team down the road. But, there are some occasions where I question if he is using the right players or not.

The one big case that comes to mind is at the running back position. Lovie has been going through a rotation of running backs the entire 2017 season so far. He had a tremendous running back, Mike Epstein, go down with an injury but before that injury, Lovie wasn’t playing him as much as he should.

Throughout all of the running back rotations over the last six games, one player has managed to get lost in the mix. Kendrick Foster was pegged as the starting running back for the Illini coming into the season and now he is not even getting carries.

Foster received eight carries in the first game against Ball State. He then had three carries against Western Kentucky and one carry against Nebraska. That is it, though. He hasn’t touched the ball on offense the last two games and didn’t see a touch against South Florida either. This has me completely puzzled.

I know 12 carries for 21 yards isn’t good on paper but that is such a small sample size. He had a good 2016 campaign rushing for 720 yards and having a 5.7 yards per carry average. That is still there and I am not sure why Lovie isn’t using him.

In yesterday’s game against Rutgers, instead of using Foster in the wake of Epstein being out the rest of the 2017 campaign, Lovie went with Ra’Von Bonner as the starting running back. Behind him, the other two ball carriers were Reggie Corbin and Dre Brown. Foster wasn’t even a thought. This really has me wondering what they are thinking right now.

Having Foster might not have helped win a game this season but it could have. Illinois has failed to establish much of a running game lately and having an experienced player like Foster carrying the ball could have helped.