CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — For at least a few more days, Bret Bielema and his coaching staff can operate with a cloud of mystery hanging over their team.
On Saturday, the scheme, depth chart and rotation will all come to light beginning at noon when Illinois hosts Nebraska in a Week Zero game. Bielema, Illinois’ head coach, said on Monday that there would be no public depth chart — this isn’t a new trend, especially around the Illini program after the Lovie Smith era — to protect the secrecy of what he and his coaching staff have basked in since Bielema was hired in December.
Training camp has been largely closed to the media aside from 15-20 minute portions of individual drills. The only time anyone has seen this team do anything that looks like 11-on-11 football is during a spring scrimmage.
“As far as the status of our players, we’re not going to put out a depth chart since I know I made the comment, obviously, a couple of weeks back,” Bielema said. “Only about half the league is going to put out a depth chart and we’re going to be in the half that does not. Just going into this game, what we’re able to do and how we’re able to do it, I feel it’s in our best interest to kind of stay in the neutral mode.”
There are plenty of reasonable assumptions to make about the starters, especially since there are 22 returning super seniors to the time. Bielema, through no surprise, officially named Brandon Peters the starting quarterback.
Here’s Illini Inquirer’s prediction for the depth chart:
