It is time for the Illinois football team to end the 2024 season on a high note

I can’t believe I am saying this, but we are just hours away from the kickoff of the final game of the Illinois football regular season.

Just typing that out makes me sad. The Illini have two games remaining. The season finale is against Northwestern on Saturday, and then Illinois is slated to make a bowl game. We are projected to play Alabama in the Citrus Bowl right now.

On Saturday, Illinois heads up to Wrigley Field in Chicago to take on the Wildcats. This is a chance to end the 2024 campaign on a high note. On top of that, we can win nine games.

You have to go back to the 2007 campaign to find the last time Illinois won nine games in a regular season. That is how special this season has been for the program and the fanbase.

Ending the season right hasn’t exactly been a specialty for the Illinois football program, though. In recent years, we have struggled down the stretch, which has put a damper on some potentially solid campaigns.

Illinois football hasn’t been able to finish seasons strong in the past, but the 2024 campaign could change that

There have been some good moments for the Illini, especially during the Bret Bielema era. But even Bielema hasn’t been able to finish seasons too strong.

In 2023, Illinois managed to fight back to 5-5 after winning three out of four games. There were just two games left in the season, so we had to win one to be bowl-eligible. Illinois lost both of the final two games that season by a combined four points to miss a bowl game.

Illinois had a great season going in 2022. We made it to 7-1 and Chase Brown was running wild. Getting as high as No. 16 in the country, the Illini had a chance to win a lot of games. Instead of continuing the winning trend, Illinois proceeded to drop three in a row, which included back-to-back home games against unranked teams. We lost three out of the last four games of the 2022 season.

I could continue on, but I wouldn’t stop for quite some time. Illinois has been a notoriously bad team late in seasons. You have to go back to the 2007 Rose Bowl run to find the last season Illinois finished the final four games above .500. That means the last time Illinois finished the final four games of a season 3-1 or better was nearly 20 years ago.

With a win on Saturday against Northwestern, that clock resets. Illinois would finish the 2024 season 3-1 in the final four games. We would also go 9-3 overall and 6-3 in the Big Ten. Let’s end this great season with a bang and take down the Wildcats.