The early National Signing Day has come and gone, and the Illinois football team stood tall when the dust settled.
It was a great day for the Illini. This was one of the best recruiting periods I have ever seen for the program. The players that signed on with the Orange and Blue have a decent chance to help the team from day one, and I am excited to see what this class turns into down the road.
Illinois ended up finishing the early National Signing Day with the No. 21 class in the country. Bret Bielema knocked it out of the park, and there were some trends he bucked, too.
Here are the five biggest Illinois football recruiting victories on National Signing Day
5. Illinois had no one flip away
With National Signing Day comes a lot of craziness. The biggest thing is whether or not the players you have committed will actually stay with the program.
Throughout my lifetime, there have always been Illinois commits who end up getting poached by an opposing team. For one reason or another, the player departs, and the Illini are left out to dry.
For the class of 2026, that didn’t happen. I believe every Illinois recruit remained committed to the program. There wasn’t a single player who decided to head elsewhere, unless I am missing someone who wasn’t rated highly and snuck through the cracks.
I think this goes to how well the coaching staff at Illinois understands the recruiting game. This isn’t about going and getting a commitment and then not communicating with that player for months. Illinois’ coaches build relationships and stick with the player through and through.
This was an amazing recruiting class, and it is a true testament to how well the Illinois program is running right now. It is incredible that the Illini didn’t lose a single player.
4. The Illinois class of 2026 is full
In years past, Illinois recruiting classes went one of two ways. Either the Illini were able to land a couple of four-star recruits, but then the rest of the recruiting class would struggle, or Illinois wouldn’t bring in any top players and have a ton of two- and three-star recruits.
My jaw is still on the floor from how unbelievable the Illinois class of 2026 has turned out to be. Bielema bucked the trend of what I just mentioned. He not only landed the top talent, but this is the fullest class I have ever seen.
Illinois pulled in and signed a total of 30 players on Wednesday. None of the players decided to wait until the regular signing day in February. They all signed on the line and made it official in December.
The class of 2026 is filled with a nice mix, too. We have plenty of quality freshmen coming into the program, but there are also some high-level junior college players who can have more of an immediate impact.
Bielema knows Illinois is going through a big change. He had to start knocking it out of the park with recruiting, and this class of 2026 is one of the biggest I have ever seen come through Champaign.
3. The rare re-flip went in Illinois’ favor
I keep going back to the past, but in past recruiting classes, Illinois was always the program that had players flip away. We would lose a few recruits to other programs.
Here is the thing, Illinois kind of had that back in June. We had Javari Barnett come to campus for an official visit in April, and days later, he committed to the program.
In mid-June, Barnett then took an official visit to Alabama. The Crimson Tide did their thing, and Barnett ended up flipping his commitment and picked Alabama instead.
I thought this recruitment was over. Barnett wasn’t even on my radar. But on Wednesday, Illinois did the rarest of rare things. We managed to do the re-flip. Barnett ended up flipping back to the Illini.
This is great for the Illini. He is a solid three-star running back who is the No. 474 player in the class of 2026. I don’t know what happened with Barnett at Alabama, but the fact that he can have roughly 29 scholarship offers, most from massive programs, and decide to flip back to Illinois is huge.
Illinois is always in need of some more running back depth. With injuries and the transfer portal, you just never know who is going to be available on the field. Having a player like Barnett come into the program is going to give the Illini offense another weapon.
2. Bret Bielema pulled off a 4-star flip
While the re-flip of Barnett was fun, and it was big for the Illini, the biggest achievement for Bielema on Wednesday came in the form of a regular flip.
Illinois was in the running for offensive lineman Micah Smith for quite some time. Back in April, everything with his recruitment started to heat up, as he was taking official visits.
The Illini got his first official visit, and that was on April 4. UCLA was next on May 15. After his official visit to the Bruins, Smith decided to commit to UCLA. This was the first sign that I thought Illinois was out of the running.
Well, UCLA ended up firing their head coach, so Smith might have been back on the table. But then the talented offensive lineman took two more official visits. Smith visited Ohio State on October 4 and Tennessee on October 31. This signaled that Illinois was done with this recruitment.
On Wednesday, the Illini sent shockwaves through the college football landscape. We ended up flipping Smith away from UCLA, and beat out Tennessee and Ohio State for his commitment. This is easily the biggest recruiting achievement thus far for Bielema.
Smith is a four-star offensive lineman who has a chance to come in and see snaps from day one. He joins a nice, experienced group of newcomers, too. This is a great haul for Illinois, and it was capped off by the biggest recruiting surprise of my lifetime.
1. One of the best Illini recruiting classes ever
The last thing I want to point out as a massive recruiting victory is the fact that this Illinois class of 2026 is one of the best ever.
You can make an argument for the class of 2008, and I am sure there were classes prior to the recruiting rankings era, but from top to bottom, Bielema has pulled in one of the legendary recruiting classes of all time.
As I mentioned earlier, the quantity is there for the Illini. We signed 30 players, which is the most that I can remember. Illinois needed to boost the roster, and we did that in a huge way.
The quality of the class of 2026 is special as well. It used to be how many top 1000 recruits Illinois could land. Now, it is how few sub-1000 recruits are in the class of 2026. Illinois only technically has eight sub-1000 recruits, meaning that we have landed 22 top 1000 recruits. That is an incredible number considering that around 14 top 1000 recruits used to be a good recruiting class.
Illinois also landed the elite-level talent. We aren’t just loading up on three-star guys. Illinois pulled in five four-star recruits. A bonus to the top guys is that they are all in crucial positions. We have two defensive backs and two offensive linemen in that mix of five four-star recruits.
This was a special day for the Illinois football program. Everything went our way, which is a rarity. Bielema is winning on the field, and he is building on that momentum in the recruiting game. The future is so bright.