5 massive observations from the Illinois football win over Rutgers

5. Bret Bielema found a way to win

I hear people criticizing Bret Bielema quite often. Some of it is earned and some not. I have been on the criticism bandwagon before.

Even in the game against Rutgers, I mentioned that I was surprised that Illinois had all three timeouts left with four minutes to go in the game. Usually, we blow a timeout or two pointlessness sometime in the third quarter and it comes back to bite us.

As much guff as Bielema gets for his in-game situations, I think you have to give him praise when the program comes through and gets a victory when it looked like the chips were down.

Bielema might make a few mistakes here and there, but he figures out a way to win. He gets the job done, and Illinois now has eight wins in two out of the past three seasons.

You can’t say the same about other coaches. Matt Rhule over at Nebraska finds ways to lose games. He can’t figure out how to get over the hump in one-score contests.

When you look down at Kansas, Lance Leipold is starting to figure things out, but he had struggled in tight games too. The Jayhawks are 1-5 in one-score games this season.

I know that the Illinois coaching staff has issues at times. I call out many things I have issues with when it comes to coaching. But you have to give credit where credit is due. Bielema finds a way to win games whether it is ugly or not. They are wins.