5 huge observations from the Illinois football win over Eastern Illinois

3. The Illini need to clean up the dumb penalties

It is hard to point out any negatives in a game when you win 45-0. Illinois played nearly flawless football, but there was one thing that stood out to me the most.

Illinois must get rid of the dumb penalties. No, we didn’t have a ton of penalties or penalty yardage. Illinois finished with six penalties for 45 yards. But it was the type of penalties and the timing that killed us.

In the second quarter, Illinois was going to get Eastern Illinois off the field. We forced an incompletion on 3rd-and-5, but a pointless offsides penalty enabled the Panthers to extend the drive another series.

Coming out in the second half, Illinois once again stopped Eastern Illinois on third down with a sack. Instead of getting the ball back, the Illini were called with another offsides penalty that gave the Panthers 3rd-and-8, and they would convert and extend the drive.

As I said, there weren’t a ton of penalties or penalty yardage, but they were pointless penalties that could have cost us points. Illinois can’t afford to have those drive-extending mistakes against teams like Kansas and Michigan. We need to clean those up and stop letting the opposing team get extra downs.