Media Days: Illinois hopes 2024 season is a springboard to long term success
LAS VEGAS — After a breakout 10-3 campaign in 2024, Illinois football enters the 2025 season with rising expectations and a belief that more success is within reach. The Illinois schedule ahead poses challenges, but head coach Bret Bielema and athletic director Josh Whitman see a manageable path — and a chance to build something lasting.
The Illini will face a critical stretch in the middle of the season, with several key games packed into October and no bye week until late in the year.
“We play the latest game without a break,” Bielema said. “We don’t play a bye week until week 8. People have them as early as week 2 and 3. So we have the latest bye week of any team in our conference.”
That extended stretch without rest includes four straight matchups that could define the season, culminating in a date in Memorial Stadium with the defending national champion Buckeyes.
“That just happens to come after a four-game stretch where we are at Indiana, at home against USC, at Purdue, and at home against Ohio State,” Bielema said. “A four-game stretch there that is pretty intense. I think that is probably our biggest challenge.”
Overall, its a favorable schedule. ESPN ranks Illinois 44th nationally in strength of schedule to start 2025. Illinois does not appear In Phil Steele’s list of the 50 toughest schedules nationally.
But, the Illini will host Ohio State in Week 7 — the final game before the bye — in what could be the toughest test of the season.
“We’re going to have to be at our best in Week 7,” Bielema said. “On paper our toughest opponent I’m sure from the outside world is Ohio State.”
Despite the midseason gauntlet, Illinois avoids several of the Big Ten’s other heavyweights in 2025, including Michigan, Penn State. That balance gives the Illini a chance to repeat or even improve upon their 10-win performance, which Whitman believes may be the beginning of a new chapter for the program. Sustained success is ultimately the goal.
“The very first time (Bielema) and I spoke we talked about that being the objective,” Whitman said. “It’s been an interesting history. We’ve had moments when we’ve been to the top of the mountain. We’ve won Big Ten championships. We’ve played Rose Bowls.”
Fans have seen highs before — and the disappointments that followed. After a 10-2 season and Big Ten title in 2001, the Illini fell to just five wins the next year. In 2007, head coach Ron Zook and quarterback Juice Williams led Illinois to the Rose Bowl, only to finish 5-7 in 2008. Those letdowns have shaped how Whitman and Bielema are approaching this next phase of growth.
“What’s made us a little bit different is we haven’t also capitalized on those moments of success and made them springboards to greater success,” Whitman added. “We’ve done a lot of due diligence and thought about why those moments have happened.”
With a manageable but demanding schedule and growing confidence within the program, Illinois will look to not only replicate last year’s success — but finally turn it into something long-term.
