Bret Bielema spoke to local Champaign media Friday afternoon.
Coming off a 5-7 season last year in which several games were decided by a touchdown or fewer, including a season-finale defeat against Northwestern to end the year.
With most of its roster back for both teams, Illinois faces an interesting yet fairly common conundrum in the post-NIL world of college football – the transfer portal. The Illini have 45 new players on this year's roster, be it freshmen or players with experience at other schools that aren't Illinois.
"Anytime your gameplan matches the results, that's a good thing, right?" Bielema said Friday. "We won't know that till after we're done . I think going into this game, to have as many guys as we have, as I mentioned earlier, that have played some good football for us at key positions. But we got some new faces. It's gonna be critical how they play and how they fit into our scheme.
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