Illinois likely to overtake Northwestern in bowl pecking order
With Illinois' 48-27 win over Northwestern at Wrigley Field on Saturday afternoon, Ron Zook earned his second bowl berth in his six-year reign.
There's a good chance the Illini (6-5, 4-4) will jump over Northwestern (7-4, 3-4) in the Big Ten bowl pecking order, especially if they win their regular-season finale Dec. 3 at Fresno State.
With Purdue's and Indiana's losses Saturday, the Big Ten is locked into eight bowl teams this fall and the league has eight bowl tie-ins.
If the league doesn't get an at-large BCS berth, then the Big Ten must send its No. 8 team to the Little Caesar's Pizza Bowl.
The MAC seems likely to fill that bowl with West Division champ Northern Illinois. The Huskies (9-2) already played Illinois this season, so that leaves Northwestern as the best potential matchup.
Put another way, there's not much chance the Big Ten's bigger bowl partners would bypass Iowa (7-4), Penn State (7-4) or Michigan (7-4) in order to take the Wildcats.
Watkins wisdom:
With the exception of several fourth-quarter snaps at Indiana, redshirt freshman quarterback Evan Watkins had never played with a college game on the line until Saturday.
His first start didn't work out as hoped as his inexperience worked against him. On several pass plays, he didn't get the ball out as rapidly as NU quarterbacks are expected to do.
“It was my first time of actual experience, seeing things in front of me at that speed and at that level,” Watkins said. “And just understanding the timing of our routes and getting the ball out on time (were things I learned).”
Watkins hit 50 percent of his passes and rushed for a net of 15 yards. True freshman Kain Colter took several snaps as a changeup and rushed three times for 10 yards but did not throw.
Injured starter Dan Persa, who used crutches to get to midfield for the coin toss, completed at least 62 percent of his passes in each of his 10 starts and rushed for a season-low 13 yards against Illinois State because he sat out the final 20 minutes.
The Wildcats ran a season-low 48 plays and held the ball for a season-low 18 minutes, 44 seconds.
Leshoure's day:
Junior running back Mikel Leshoure's 330-yard effort ranks fifth on the Big Ten's all-time list.
Indiana's Anthony Thompson set the mark of 377 yards in 1989. Robert Holcombe had the Illinois record (315 yards).
Illinois' 519 rushing yards ranked No. 2 on the school's all-time list, but first against a Big Ten foe.