Illinois Football: Illini secure transfer commitment from TeRah Edwards

Just before the early National Signing Day, the Illinois football team has landed another big-time transfer.

This past Friday, the Illini secured a transfer commitment from Syracuse quarterback, Tommy DeVito. Illinois landing DeVito was huge for the program, as we now have stability at the quarterback position. But another position Illinois needed to fill was on the defensive line.

Bret Bielema and his coaching staff addressed that need on Tuesday morning with a transfer commitment from Northwestern defensive lineman, TeRah Edwards.

TeRah Edwards is a player who will make an impact from day one for the Illinois football team.

Edwards was a highly touted recruit coming out of Groveport Madison High School in Ohio. He was a three-star recruit and was ranked as the No. 855 player in the class of 2022.

A ton of teams were eyeing Edwards. He had roughly 23 scholarship offers with some of the bigger programs being Michigan, Penn State, and Tennessee. Despite all of those big programs wanting Edwards to play for them, he decided to pick Northwestern as the landing spot.

Edwards didn’t get a ton of action with the Wildcats. He played in a couple of games in the two seasons and accumulated a couple of tackles in this span. Edwards would end his run at Northwestern back on November 29 when he announced that he was entering the transfer portal.

Now Illinois is getting a defensive tackle who can play the nose. Defensive coordinator Ryan Walters is losing his anchor on the defensive line in nose tackle, Rod Perry II. Perry was sensational since transferring in from South Carolina State. But now the Illini have to navigate without him moving forward.

Edwards should be able to come into the program and compete for the starting job from day one. I think Calvin Avery might end up winning the nod, but at least we have more competition. Competition only brings out the best in players.

This is another great get for Bielema. He keeps building the Illinois roster. One of the big issues Bielema had coming into the coaching job was depth. He is now slowly but surely solving that issue.