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Illinois Football: Assessment of the Illini through two games

By Rees Woodcock

CHAMPAIGN, IL - SEPTEMBER 01: Head coach Lovie Smith of the Illinois Fighting Illini and members of the Illinois Fighting Illini sing the school alma mater following the game against the Kent State Golden Flashes at Memorial Stadium on September 1, 2018 in Champaign, Illinois. (Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images)
CHAMPAIGN, IL - SEPTEMBER 01: Head coach Lovie Smith of the Illinois Fighting Illini and members of the Illinois Fighting Illini sing the school alma mater following the game against the Kent State Golden Flashes at Memorial Stadium on September 1, 2018 in Champaign, Illinois. (Photo by Michael Hickey/Getty Images) /
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The season is young for this Illinois football team, and there are some things that we need to assess as fans.

The first question I want to ask; is this Illini team where we thought they would be to start the 2018 campaign?

I think this is a complex question with a few answers. I think Illinois is right where I expected them to be record wise. They should have won the first two games and that is exactly what they did. But, not everything about the team is where I want it to be.

The defense isn’t where I wanted it to be right now. I thought they would be more dominating, especially against the first two teams considering they are Kent State and Western Illinois. The offense hasn’t been as good as I thought either. They haven’t gelled to start games and this has put the team in a hole. Overall improvement needs to step up.

I want to look at the biggest disappointment and biggest surprise so far this season. I would say the biggest disappointment has been the Illini secondary. Coming into the season, I thought the secondary was going to transition into a strong area for the Illini. But, thanks to a few suspensions and an injury to Tony Adams, Illinois has struggled immensely against the passing attack.

With that being said, I don’t want to take away from the players who are out there every game performing the best they can. There have been some really good plays made, but Illinois is giving up an average of 273 yards per game through the air with a 67-percent completion rate. That is not very good against an FCS program and Kent State.

Illinois has also had some big-time bright spots so far this season. One area that I would like to point out is the running back position. The duo of Mike Epstein and Reggie Corbin has been something special so far.

In the first game against Kent State, Epstein and Corbin ran for a combined 112 yards and three touchdowns. They also hit the 6.2 yards per carry average, which is pretty good. The Western Illinois game was even better. They totaled 168 yards on the ground and one touchdown. They managed to average 7.3 yards per carry in that game.

Illinois needs to make Epstein and Corbin a bigger part of the offense moving forward. These two have a lot of talent and need to be the focal point of the offense.

Next. 5 observations from the win over Western Illinois. dark

Overall, I am happy that Illinois is 2-0 this season, but I think there is a lot of room for improvement. We will find out where we are as a team this Saturday when we take on South Florida. This will be a good test for this young Illini team.

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