The B1G Loves Lovie
May 14th, 2016
No B1G respect.
Time to check in and see how things are going in the Illinois cornfields for Coach My Scheme, otherwise known as Lovie Smith.
Weeks after Team Glazer tired watching low-rung quarterbacks like has-been Matt Hasselbeck and never-been Derek Anderson tear apart the Bucs’ pass defense, and told Lovie not to bother any longer with the Bucs, Lovie took a job at a moribund football program, the University of Illinois.
It was an odd hire, but desperate programs take desperate steps for relevance.
The folks of the Midwest, and the East Coast regions crept into by the Big Ten Conference (B1G), are neither excited nor losing much sleep over the Lovie hire.
For example, in a recent Fighting Illini online football chat by Bob Asmussen of the Champaign News-Press, the paper of record for Illini sports, there were a grand total of five questions offered. You can feel the sizzle from here.
Then, there is the following nugget from the publisher Phil Steele himself of the five-star college football annual, the Phil Steele’s College Football Preview. The highly respected college football sophist noted an oddity with this year’s Illini road B1G schedule.
Illinois is Homecoming opponent for 4 Big Ten teams this year.
at Nebraska Oct 1
at Rutgers Oct 15
at Michigan Oct 22
at Wisconsin Nov 12— Phil Steele (@philsteele042) May 14, 2016
Generally, schools try to schedule a patsy for their homecoming game. So it doesn’t seem like Lovie is making many B1G coaches lose sleep. Yet. The fact the Illini are a homecoming opponent for four conference foes (including Rutgers!) speaks volumes about what B1G administrators and coaches think of Lovie’s hiring.
This shouldn’t shock Bucs fans. The Bucs played the part of patsy way too many times the past two years.
May 14th, 2016 at 8:35 am
I send all my condolences to all Illini Fans!!!To have no chance of competing is a very depressing feeling!!! At least you know that the Incompetent one will probably be sleeping instead of recruiting like he did at the scouting combine, so he will be well rested come gamedays so he can stare cluelessly at the Jumbo-tron trying to figure out what college player let his scheme down!!!!!!!!!
May 14th, 2016 at 8:42 am
harbaugh and meyer are going to make the alums rich this year even if its a 4 td spread
May 14th, 2016 at 8:48 am
I hate to pi$$ in your morning cornflakes, Joe, but I’d venture to say those games were scheduled well before Lovie’s hire.
Please correct me if I’m wrong.
The games, of course, were scheduled. The homecoming designation? That’s a different animal.–Joe
May 14th, 2016 at 8:52 am
Fightin’ Illini were a patsy before Lovie got there, this could be where he needs to be, I have seen Illinois on a few of some of the 4 & 5 star recruits list of schools. Will they be OSU, likely not, but let’s not blow him out the water before he gets started.
Sincerely,
The Fired Bucs Coaches of America
Tony, Jon, Raheem, Greg & Lovie
May 14th, 2016 at 8:55 am
We went through some really ruff times during the Lovie Era from being embarrassed nationally on TNF to going 0-8 and being the laughing stock of the league once sgain. But if it wasn’t for Lovie we wouldn’t have guys like coach Kotter and the great Jason Licht. Because he hand picked those guys to Come here himself. And most importantly we wouldn’t have our savior in Jameis Winston and would more ths likely still be looking for our franchise QB. So at the end of that deep dark tunnel is a bright light.and I wish Lovie all the best at Illinois.
May 14th, 2016 at 8:57 am
I second what realist posted. It is a travesty knowing you have no chance because of coaching. At least lovie went to an irrelevant football program with zero expectations. Also the parents and administration can sleep well knowing at least cursing will be under control in the corn fields.
May 14th, 2016 at 9:02 am
@Tmaxcon
Also, if I am a high school QB Prospect, I am looking to go to the Big 10. You can pad your stats and make a great highlight video against the Incompetent one’s defense!!!!!!!!
May 14th, 2016 at 9:13 am
They will be lucky to get to one bowl game with that loser
May 14th, 2016 at 9:15 am
The college game is a different animal…hopefully he will have some success. I wish Lovie the best. However, I’m glad the Bucs made the change. I haven’t been this excited since the Gruden hiring. What I think makes the difference is quality coaches at ever position. Go Bucs!
May 14th, 2016 at 9:28 am
I’m still not convinced the homecoming game wasn’t announced before Lovie’s hiring, Joe.
It ins’t easy for me to defend Lovie, but I think you’re still trolling him here.
May 14th, 2016 at 9:40 am
Realist
Very true recruiting qb’s just got easier for rest of teams in conference
K2
The college game is different yes but lovie being a horrible coach and possibly worst game day coach in history has not changed.
May 14th, 2016 at 9:53 am
Where are all the bitter incompetent LovieDovie do-no-wrong loyalists that spent the better part of two years trying to convince the few objectively rational fans here that this man was greatness personified in coaching?
Crickets…
Good luck to the Cryin’ Illini. They’re gonna need it.
May 14th, 2016 at 10:05 am
DallasBuc
don’t worry Bonzi will be here shortly to tell us objective fans how wrong we are and that Licht screwed everything up and Lovie took the fall. Then Mike Johnson and Bighog will stop by to call us all racists… Just another day on JBF…
May 14th, 2016 at 10:07 am
@ Tmaxcon & The Buc Realist: why don’t you two rent a party bus and take all your friends out to the mid-west corn fields and satisfy your tast for some LOVIE BALL, I’m sur Coach My Scheme, wouldn’t mind, and my race card still in my wallet, you guys can’t help yourself!
May 14th, 2016 at 10:08 am
Lovie should have dropped to a lower rung of coaching, say peewee football. That way he could of built his credentials up and moved up to big peewee football.
May 14th, 2016 at 10:12 am
the Bucs/colts game wa painful, watching judy adjeh barima lose the game for us–he was awful in that game. I hope that dude is cut.
May 14th, 2016 at 10:29 am
Buccfan37
why would you wish that on poor little peewees. You seem like a real decent guy why would you wish such horrible coaching on little kids… harsh lol…
May 14th, 2016 at 10:39 am
Lovie articles……just like throwing some raw meat out for a bunch of wild dogs……gets them chomping every time!!!
How about a dash of Michael Bennett to top off the morning…..
May 14th, 2016 at 10:39 am
Any one who thinks Lovie epitomizes “greatness” hasn’t been paying attention.
To be real tho, Illini was a cupcake before Lovie and it will be a cupcake after Lovie.
May 14th, 2016 at 11:24 am
Lovie was loved here to, until he actually started coaching games…
May 14th, 2016 at 11:36 am
Joe…you just LOVE getting everyone riled up don’t you?
May 14th, 2016 at 11:44 am
Saw those slants again in my sleep last night.
May 14th, 2016 at 11:50 am
Well we know for sure that Kirk Cousins is sad to see the Incompetent one go!!!!
YOU LIKE THAT!!!!!!!!
May 14th, 2016 at 11:50 am
tmaxcon Says:
” Also the parents and administration can sleep well knowing at least cursing will be under control in the corn fields.”
Also no motor scooters, don’t forget the scooter ban.
To the Illini players I would tell them this. Don’t sell your scooters.
May 14th, 2016 at 11:50 am
http://www.news-gazette.com/sports/illini-sports/football/2016-05-11/asmussen-lovie-puts-brakes-scooters.html
May 14th, 2016 at 12:36 pm
Feeding time at the Buc Zoo. Joe’s throwing out the AM serving of Lovie meat for the animals to devour. Surprisingly though, not many negative comments about ole Lovie. Could it be Buc fans have had their fill of Lovie hangings/bashings? Nahh not just yet. Come on You blastin varmits…Lovie bashers..UNITE!!
May 14th, 2016 at 12:45 pm
@Mike Johnson
Its just starting!!! This is just the first nibble the players are getting from the new defensive scheme and DC Coach Smitty!!! Wait until training camp, and you are going to hear players say along the lines of ” no disrespect to lovie, but we are running a real defensive scheme that is not outdated”!!!!!!
And that is when we will see the “Real” bashing!!!
Go Bucs!!!
May 14th, 2016 at 1:36 pm
I don’t see Lazy Lovie doing any recruiting, the key to a successful college football team. He will be insisting on controlling everything in the program and playing all season swapping players around trying to see who fits his scheme and insisting that his front four has to do all the rushing without help from blitzes. All so predictable! He best be banking all his millions in savings because he will be unemployable in two years, “simple as that!” Ha!
May 14th, 2016 at 3:46 pm
I’m going to say something nice about Lovie. There I did.
May 14th, 2016 at 3:51 pm
Buc Realist…We excuse you. Everybody who post here knows you are still trying to get your..Special Education Diploma. And we support you!
May 14th, 2016 at 4:25 pm
The Lovie bashing is ridiculous – the guy got that defense to be #10 in the league last year, a top 10 defense. Picking between keeping Lovie or keeping Dirk I got with Dirk, but only if it was a choice of only keeping one – but for people to think Lovie die a terrible job when he had a top 5 offense, a top 10 defense and tripled his win total with a rookie quarterback, it’s insincere at best. Best of luck Lovie.
May 14th, 2016 at 4:58 pm
Hey Joe, What is Sam Wyche up to these days? Maybe Ray Perkins or Greg Schiano? I know you write about what you want to and I applaud you for that but can’t we just let Lovie go please.
May 14th, 2016 at 5:03 pm
Wow rod….
Let me remind you of the complete story since you are making a delusional statement that lovie coached a top 10 defense last year. 70% completion percentage… 26 in pts allowed. 3Rd and long was a gimmie…. slant passes were guaranteed way to gain a first. that hot garbage defense was not top 10 in anyone’s book. Way to take a statistc completely out of context. I’m not even going to get into all the players that regressed under Lovie’s pathetic friends and family staff.
May 14th, 2016 at 7:33 pm
I they hate LOVIE more than they love the BUCS!
May 14th, 2016 at 8:10 pm
Joe continues to write about ex-coaches when they are in the news or Joe finds something interesting about an ex-coach. Just had a Chucky story yesterday. Didn’t notice anyone b!tching about that and asking Joe to “Let Chucky go.” Not sure why Lovie should be given special treatment and not be written about.
As always, if there is a story that doesn’t fit your agenda or the topic is not about what you like, you are free not to read the post.
May 14th, 2016 at 8:28 pm
tmaxcon – The stats say that wasn’t happening, and for the most part it wasn’t. When you give up points but not yards that is generally due to the other teams offense having a short field to play with. The 70% completion has a lot to do with teams running short slants based on the fact the run game wasn’t doing anything against the defense, you get a lot of 4-5 yard slants. It’s the bend don’t break defense, and for the most part the defense was doing their job. Based on the poor corner play and the team having no NFL starting level safeties I don’t believe at all Lovie did a good job. What was a really stupid thing was to give-up on Barron, something I hated at the time, and to then cut Revis – those were two amazingly stupid moves based on the fact the team was drafting nothing but offensive players. My point is Lovie was doing his job, firing your coaches every 2 years just leads to 2-14 to 6-10 teams. This year when the team starts off 2-5 how many of these Lovie bashers are going to be demanding that Dirk get fired? I hope whatever happens with Dirk he’s here for at least 4 years, at least. If the Bucs knew someone else was going to make Dirk their head coach and they had to make this move to block it, then fine, but you just dumped a defensive coach with a top 5 offense to put a guy in Mike Smith running the defense after his defenses in Atlanta were nearly always sub-par. I don’t see why we think there is going to be this sudden budding – and I don’t know why if you gave Lovie these same new additions we’d assume he’d not do better.
May 14th, 2016 at 9:18 pm
Bravo Joe bravo.
May 14th, 2016 at 9:24 pm
“I don’t see why we think there is going to be this sudden budding – and I don’t know why if you gave Lovie these same new additions we’d assume he’d not do better.”
Rod…Sorry to interject, but stats mean jack shyte to me. Lovie’s in-game decisions were piss poor. Hence another reason why he was fired. If Dirk makes the same poor in-game decisions than he’s not that far behind Lovely.
Stats don’t always tell the whole story. We know what we saw. YOU know what you saw. Apparently stats do it for you though, so forget what you saw.
May 14th, 2016 at 10:05 pm
Rod, if you believe in yards then you believe we had a top 5 offense last year. Yards doesn’t mean $hit when taken out of context. If you watched the games you wouldn’t make statements like that.
May 15th, 2016 at 12:40 am
Am I banned for life?
May 15th, 2016 at 12:45 am
Guess not. Just wanted to chime in and wish luck to Coach Smith at Illionois.
May 15th, 2016 at 2:29 am
Awww…isn’t it sweet the shameless few quizzical and forgiving bunch that hold on to a time that never was?
Precious incompetent Lovie Smith fan.
Be. Still. My. Heart.
May 15th, 2016 at 8:31 am
Lol, now that was funny Joe. BKNYfootball trying to be a snarky smart ass about the games being scheduled well in advance. Of course he is just one of many posters here that type and send before thinking. Was good to see Joe call him out though. Even funnier when he fired back and still tried to defend himself rather than admit he was just trying to show Joe up and failed.
May 15th, 2016 at 11:56 am
@rod munch
lovie’s defense also gave up 5.2 yards a play.;thats not good,a first down every two plays.the Defense gave up an average of 100 yards a game rushing.
the buc defense has always been stout against the run,but not last year.
May 15th, 2016 at 1:02 pm
Eric – the Bucs did have a top 5 offense last year. Wow.
May 15th, 2016 at 1:45 pm
TDTB,
Lighten up. Joe isn’t thin-skinned to a barb.
Homecoming games were scheduled before Lovie’s hire in early March. That’s a fact.
Days ago they announced the kick off times for all Big Ten homecoming games.
The internet was used before I made my comment.