Illinois Football: Illini betting favorites to land top transfer portal quarterback

With the transfer portal in full force, there has been plenty of talk about the next Illinois football quarterback.

Who could end up filling the shoes of Tommy DeVito? That is a big question for the fanbase and the future success of the Illini.

The Writing Illini published a list of Illinois’s top five transfer portal quarterbacks to target. This list consisted of some pretty big names, and now the Orange and Blue are the betting favorites to land one of the names.

On Tuesday, Bookies.com produced the odds to land North Carolina State transfer Devin Leary. The talented quarterback hit the transfer market a few days ago, and every team in the country is salivating over this kid.

Illinois is currently the betting favorite to land Leary at +250. They have the Illini as a 28.57% chance of securing his transfer commitment. The No. 2 favorite is Notre Dame at +400. Alabama, Missouri, and Other are next on the list at +500.

Illinois football has connections to transfer portal quarterback Devin Leary.

I think it is pretty obvious why Illinois is the current betting favorite to land Leary. There are too many connections between the Illini, Leary, and the North Carolina State program.

The most obvious connection is the fact Leary’s brother, Donovan, is on the Illinois roster. He is the future starting quarterback, but it would be optimal to have him learn another year behind someone like his brother.

Another connection would be the fact that North Carolina State’s head coach, Dave Doeren, was a defensive coordinator for Bielema for five seasons in Wisconsin. That connection has to carry some weight, and I would venture to say there have been some calls made.

Those two big connections are important, but I also believe the proof is in the pudding. At Wisconsin, Bielema secured a transfer quarterback from North Carolina State in Russell Wilson. They went on to see great success together. Bielema was able to land DeVito this past offseason. DeVito had one of his best seasons at the college level, and Illinois had the most wins since 2007.

Bielema has proved he can bring transfer quarterbacks into his program and take them to the next level. He gets the best out of the transfer quarterbacks, and Leary could be next in line. Hopefully, we can beat out the myriad of other programs to land this future NFL talent.