Nebraska vs Illinois Betting Preview and Prediction

 Nebraska vs Illinois Betting Preview and Prediction

Only one game August 28, featuring two teams from the Midwest playing each other this week.

Nebraska vs Illinois- Both teams are from the Big Ten Conference and they get to start the season on Week 0 of College Football.

Nebraska vs Illinois- The Fighting Illini

Fired coach Lovie Smith, didn’t leave much for new coach Bret Bielema to work with. Bielema formerly coached in the Big Ten at Wisconsin following Barry Alvarez. This is different. Wisconsin was an established presence in the conference. The Illini has been at the bottom for many years. So where does he begin?
Start with your quarterback, which is sixth-year senior Brandon Peters at 6’5” 220 lbs. He has started 16 games and has a 54% completion rate along with 25 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. He spent his first three years at Michigan before transferring. He has averaged 3.5 yards per carry and has four running touchdowns, His backup will be junior Arthur Sitkowski, a former QB at Rutgers at 6’5” and 224 lbs
Tight end junior Daniel Barker comes in at 6’4” and 250 lbs. He caught 19 passes for 269 yards and two touchdowns in 2020. Also a junior is wide receiver Brian Hightower 6’3” 210 lbs.)and he grabbed 11 passes for three touchdowns and 209 yards last year. In the fold is Notre Dame transfer Jafar Armstrong. He had 383 yards rushing with 14 passes caught and 159 yards in 2018.
Isaiah Williams will switch from quarterback to receiver. Last year he averaged 6.2 yards per carry for the Illini. Chase Brown was solid as a running back with 5,2 yards per carry and Mike Epstein had 5.5 yards per carry and 67.5 per game.

Nebraska Vs Illinois – The Cornhuskers

Since coach Scott Frost took over in Nebraska his team hasn’t played well against Illinois. Bielema will have a better team than last season.

The Huskers have the stronger arm at quarterback in the conference with senior Adrain Martinez.He was benched for awhile last year now we see him getting all of the offense under his care. But will coach Frost have the patience to live through rough times?
The offense will have Oliver Martin handling the rushes and Austin Allen at the tight end spot. Markese Stepp comes in from USC to look for handoffs going to him. He was injured during the Spring game.
The defense should be terrific this season with a front line of Ben Stille, Damion Daniels and Ty Robinson. Senior kicker Connor Culp was named all-Big Ten last year after making 13 of 15 PAT’s.
The Top Newcomer on the squad is wide receiver Samori Toure, a transfer from Montana.
Coach Frost is on the hot seat and if he loses the opener, his leash will be short.

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Nebraska vs Illinois Prediction

This is a tough call, especially so early in the season. Each team had  good looking Spring games and showed some things that weren’t in place in 2020. This is a new year and I like what I hear out of Champaign. Therefore. I take Illinois -7.5 to cover.

• Next Big Ten game preview and prediction is Ohio State vs Minnesota

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About the Author-Tom Knuppel has been writing about baseball and sports for a few decades. As an avid St. Louis Cardinals fan he began with the blog CardinalsGM. Tom is a member of the United Cardinals Bloggers and the Baseball Bloggers Alliance. He also maintains the History of Cardinals website. More recently he has been busy at KnupSolutions and the primary writer of many sports at KnupSports and adds content at Sports 2.0. Tom is a retired High School English and Speech teacher and has completed over one hundred sportsbook reviews. He also can be followed on Twitter at tknup.  Feel free to contact Tom at tknuppel@gmail.com