Illini’s hopes rest on 19-year-old’s arm

By Brian Heinemann
For The Herald

With a redshirt freshman quarterback and six new assistant coaches, the Illinois Fighting Illini are facing an uphill battle in trying to get back to where they were just three years ago. 

Coach Ron Zook sees similarities between the 2007 Rose Bowl squad and the 2010 team, from attitude to talent, though.

“It's kind of like the attitude we had a couple of years when we were fortunate enough to go to the Rose Bowl,” Zook said. “I think on paper we're probably every bit if not better a football team than we were that year. But still there's so many things that enter into it.”

The most important thing the Illini have to figure out is how to help their 19-year-old quarterback, Nathan Scheelhaase, succeed. Having two of the top three parts of the second best running attack in the Big Ten last year – 17th in the NCAA – will certainly help. 

“It's going to be important that our offensive staff, Coach (Paul) Petrino and the offensive coaches, that we keep as much pressure off him as we can,” Zook said.

With the kind of defense the Illini had last year, though, Scheelhaase stands to face plenty of pressure to score. Illinois ranked near the bottom of the nation in just about every defensive category last year, and were 91st in total defense, last in the Big Ten.

That was a huge drop-off from 2008, when the Illini were in the top half of the nation defensively. The key to that drop-off, and the reason Zook and his team are hopeful for a turnaround this year, was junior linebacker Martez Wilson.

“Martez got hurt in the first game last year,” Zook said. “That was a big blow. He was, no question, the leader. He had a great, great spring. He had a great camp. He was playing as well as any Mike linebacker I've been around probably anywhere. And for him to get hurt in the first game, obviously, was a big, big blow.”

Wilson, who suffered a herniated disc last season, is back at 100 percent and ready to go, something that bodes well for the embattled Illini defense. But with a porous pass defense that lost both starting safeties, that side of the ball looks to still be a major weakness for Illinois, my No. 10 team in the Big Ten.

Illinois Fighting Illini

Last year: 3-9, 2-6 Big Ten (ninth)

Lettermen returning/lost: 47 returning, 17 lost

Starters returning/lost: offense 5/6, defense 7/4, kickers 2/0.

Key returning starters: Jarred Fayson, WR, Sr.; Tavon Wilson, CB, Jr.; Mikel Leshoure, RB, Jr. 

Others to watch: Martez Wilson, LB, Jr. (second in team on tackles as sophomore, injured after one game last year); Michael Buchanan, DE-LB, So.; Eddie McGee, WR, Sr. (former QB, runs Wildcat formation)

By the numbers: 6.8 - yards per carry for Leshoure last year, best in four years in the Big Ten. 17 - the Illini’s rush offense rank nationally, good for second in the Big Ten. 5 - interceptions last year, tied for last in the NCAA. 17 - letterwinners lost, the fewest in the conference.

Schedule: After their annual opener with Missouri, Illinois gets Southern and Northern Illinois at home before starting a critical three-game stretch, hosting Ohio State Oct. 2 and then traveling to Penn State Oct. 9 and Michigan State Oct. 16. The final three games could determine a bowl game, hosting Minnesota Nov. 13, playing Northwestern at Wrigley Field Nov. 20, and finishing at Fresno State Dec. 3.

Reason for optimism: Martez Wilson is back, and he’s 100 percent. The run game was fantastic in 2009, and returns over 1,000 yards and 13 touchdowns. The defense has more experience, and the road schedule is one of the easier in the conference. The Illini also avoid Iowa and Wisconsin.

Reason for pessimism: Starting a redshirt freshman quarterback and the porous pass defense. While Zook is optimistic about Nathan Scheelhaase at quarterback, he’s never played a down of college football and has no breaking-in period with Mizzou up first. The pass defense ranked No. 100 last year, with only five interceptions and a handful of deflections.

Bottom line: Don’t look for the Illini to get back to their Rose Bowl form of three years ago. While the run game is good, defenses can stack the box against a freshman quarterback, and Illinois isn’t going to beat anybody with the pass. It would take a tremendous upset to start anything but 0-3 in conference play, and the Illini could feasibly enter the second half of the season at 1-5.

Tomorrow – No. 9: Offense makes Hoosiers a threat

Minnesota on the bottom looking up

By Brian Heinemann

For The Herald

After a surprising .500 campaign that ended with a one-point loss in the Insight Bowl, it would stand to reason that things are looking up for the Minnesota Golden Gophers.

Not so. The Gophers were gutted by graduation on the defensive side of the ball, only returning two starters this year on an already mediocre defense, and the offense was nothing to write home about. 

Couple that with one of the most daunting schedules in the nation, and Minnesota is looking at a last place finish in the Big Ten.

“We play one of the top five toughest schedules in America at the University of Minnesota,” Coach Tim Brewster said. “It's something we embrace, and are proud of.”

Facing USC, Iowa, Ohio State, Penn State and Wisconsin would be a challenging enough task even returning all 22 starters. The inexperience bothers the Gophers’ coach about as much as the schedule does. 

Which is to say, not at all.

“We've got a very young defensive football team, but it's a very talented defensive football team,” Brewster said. “We're bigger. We're stronger. We're faster. We're more athletic than we've been. And rightfully so. We need to be.”

Minnesota does have something nobody else in the Big Ten, or the country, for that matter, has – Adam Weber, the most experienced starting quarterback in the nation.

Weber has taken nearly every snap for the Gophers over the last three years, and, despite watching his quarterback throw more interceptions than touchdowns in two of those three years, Brewster is supremely confident in Weber’s abilities, on and off the field.

“I think Adam is poised to have a great season,”he said. “He's in great physical condition. Last year he had surgery prior to the season, and I don't think he was as effective as he would have liked to have been. And I think in large part a lot of it had to do with his physical condition. But he's in great physical shape. He's our captain. He's our leader.”

With the 111th-ranked rushing offense and a decimated defense, Weber will have to be the one to lead the Gophers in 2010. The ceiling is low, though, making this the Big Ten’s No. 11 team.

Minnesota Golden Gophers

Last year: 6-7, 3-5 Big Ten (eighth)

Lettermen returning/lost: 38 returning, 22 lost

Starters returning/lost: offense 9/2, defense 2/9, kickers 1/1.

Key returning starters: Adam Weber, QB, Sr.; Kim Royston, S, Sr.

Others to watch: Duane Bennett, RB, Jr. (3.8 ypc in 2009); Brandon Kirksey, DT, Jr., Mike Rallis, LB, So. (switched from safety in spring)

By the numbers: 111 - the rush offense’s national rank last year. 11 - rank, out of 11, of Minnesota’s offense in the conference. 41 - sacks allowed last year, fifth worst in the nation.

Schedule: The Gophers play a bevy of top teams, starting with USC at home Sept. 18. The road schedule is manageable, with the tests coming at Wisconsin Oct. 9 and at Michigan State Nov. 6, but the conference home schedule sees Penn State and Ohio State coming to TCF Bank Stadium Oct. 23 and Oct. 30, and Iowa closing the season Nov. 27.

Reason for optimism: Having the most experienced quarterback in the nation is a bonus for the Gophers. The defense may have lost almost everybody, but what they lost in experience, they make up for in talent and athleticism. The Gophers pulled upsets over Purdue and Michigan State last year, confidence builders for the tough schedule this year.

Reason for pessimism: The schedule and the inexperience. If USC were allowed to be ranked, that would give Minnesota five preseason Top 25 teams on the docket. Having only two defensive starters returning, one of which, Royston, is coming off a broken leg in the spring, is bad news for one of the nations’ middle-of-the-road defenses.

Bottom line: It’s going to be a down year in Minnesota, as the Gophers will struggle to reach half of the wins they earned last year and sit out bowl season for only the second time in 11 years.

Tomorrow – No. 10: Coaching shake-up, freshman QB too much for Illini to overcome

Big Ten looks loaded for 2010 season

By Brian Heinemann

For The Herald

The media that gathered at Chicago’s Hyatt Regency McCormick Place one week ago picked Ohio State to win the Big Ten for the sixth straight year, with the Iowa Hawkeyes coming in second and Wisconsin pulling up in third.

But that doesn’t mean that’s the way it’s going to be. And that doesn’t tell you a thing about where the other eight teams are bound to finish.

Over the next two weeks, I’ll be taking you inside the Big Ten with in-depth looks at each team, complete with statistical analysis, players to watch and an overall outlook. This year’s Big Ten looks loaded, which is something that hasn’t gone unnoticed by the coaches in the conference.

“I think this will be as veteran and as tough and as excellent a Big Ten in the 10 years that I’ve been here,” Ohio State Coach Jim Tressel said. “I think we do have a number of teams that can compete against anyone in America. And I think what the world remembers is what we did most recently.

“I think the most recent evidence of Big Ten football is pretty good from this past December and January.”

The Big Ten has been under fire for the better part of a decade for not performing in the late December and early January bowl games, but reversed that trend (and a 1-6 bowl record the previous year) with two BCS bowl victories and bowl wins over two other ranked teams last year.

There’s reason for optimism almost across the board in the conference. Everybody thinks they’ve gotten better, even some of the teams that were gutted by graduation. The Big Ten is home to a slew of impressive quarterbacks – Ohio State’s Terrelle Pryor, the Big Ten Preseason Offensive Player of the Year for the second straight year, Minnesota’s Adam Webber, Iowa’s Ricky Stanzi, Indiana’s Ben Chappell, Michigan State’s Kirk Cousins – and some of the best defenses in the nation.

But the schedules are tough, and not just because they have to play each other. Penn State takes on Alabama in Tuscaloosa in week two. Ohio State welcomes Miami to Columbus that same week. Minnesota hosts USC a week later. Several teams take on Notre Dame. 

And Iowa has another trip out west, where, as Coach Kirk Ferentz will tell you, Iowa  “had a game scheduled but forgot to show up” back in 2004.

“It goes without saying that I think every team in our conference, we're all going to have a lot of challenges in front of us,” Ferentz said. ”All of us play challenging schedules as a tough, competitive league, and it's going to be certainly interesting to see what happens over the next couple of months.”

Many league games – regardless of the records of the opponents at the time – came down to a handful of plays last year. Teams like Purdue, who upset Ohio State, and Indiana, who led in nine games but lost over half of those, stand to be improved this year.

It may sound like a cliche, but this year, with the competitiveness up and down the conference, things will likely come down to turnovers.

“I think there's certainly parity in all of college football,” Purdue Coach Danny Hope said. “I think our league is the same. If you play hard, never give up, and take care of the football, you have a chance to win on any given Saturday. So I think the upper echelon of the league, I think it's close. But I think it boils down to Saturdays, taking care of the football.

“The team that wins the turnover margin and plays hard is the team that probably has the best chance to win it in any league, anywhere, at any level.”

Even with parity, even with upsets and even with so many teams being ranked in the Top 25 to start the coming season, everyone knows who the team to beat supposedly  is. After all, Ohio State has been to two national title games in the past five years and has earned at least a share of the conference title for five years running.

“I think when you look at any conference, you look at the team that has won most consistently in that conference and you try and sort of set aim on that, try to get to a level to be able to play with that type of football team,” Michigan State’s Mark Dantonio said. “We don’t play them this year, so I may be not be quite as qualified to talk about them as some others, but certainly, when you look at Ohio State through the past number of years, they have unprecedented success.”

That doesn’t mean Ohio State is guaranteed another conference title, though. Far from it. Stay tuned, as tomorrow I begin breaking down each team in the Big Ten, from worst to first, culminating on Saturday, Aug. 21, when my pick for conference winner is analyzed.

Tomorrow – No. 11: Inexperience too much of a hurdle for Minnesota to overcome

My haul and who I talked to

First, the list of people I spoke with, either individually or in very small groups, yesterday.

Iowa - Coach Kirk Ferentz, Ricky Stanzi, Karl Klug, Adrian Clayborn

Penn State - Running back Evan Royster

Michigan - Cornerback Troy Woolfolk

Northwestern - Quarterback Dan Persa

Wisconsin - Safety Jay Valai

Ohio State - Wide receiver Dane Sanzenbacher

Not a bad list. Look for quotes and information from them next week, as I begin my two-week series breaking down the Big Ten.

Now, for the important part... The loot!

Clayborn fights through adversity to get to senior year

By Brian Heinemann
For The Herald

Adrian Clayborn isn’t motivated by awards or recognition. Not even a perceived disrespect.

When Michigan State linebacker Greg Jones was announced as the Big Ten Preseason Defensive Player of the Year Monday, Clayborn shrugged it off. It made sense. Jones won the postseason award for best defensive player last year, so why shouldn’t he get the same award?

“I’m always working to get better and working to be the best, but he deserved that stuff,” Clayborn said. “It should be more motivation to him to get it again this postseason.”

That’s the type of person Clayborn is. His success hasn’t gotten to his head. He hasn’t even contemplated what it would be like to have the money he’d earn by being an NFL draft pick. The furthest he will go is to say that he hopes that if he buys a car one day, it will be something nice.

“If you look at that stuff, that means you’re missing out on what you’re doing right now,” he said. “If I was to focus on that, then I’d miss out on training and stuff like that. You have to have a mindset of you have to work for that stuff, and I’m working right now for it.”

All he wants to do now is provide more of a spark to his team and his defense, helping them earn more victories and win a Big Ten title.

“He’s a great leader,” line-mate Karl Klug said. “Our top leader on the whole team, him and Ricky (Stanzi), and it’s great to have him back. Very talented, talented guy. The best part is he’s a humble guy. He’s not arrogant or anything. He won’t let you know about what he did on the field. He doesn’t want to talk about it.”

What Clayborn does talk about, though, are things that help you start to realize what makes him tick and what molded him into the person he has become.

One of the things that does motivate him are the loved ones that he’s lost. When Clayborn was only 10 – young, but old enough to remember clearly – one of his older brothers, Anthony, was killed.

“He was involved in some things that he shouldn’t have been doing, and he got shot,” Clayborn said. “He got murdered.”

Instead of using personal glory or jealousy as a motivator, Clayborn sometimes uses that.

“Sometimes it’s motivation, knowing that him and my grandma are looking over me,” he said. “I’m pretty much just working for them.”

When presented with the choice for leaving for the NFL or coming back for a senior season, Clayborn’s parents left the decision up to him. He took two weeks for due process but knew, with 99 percent certainty, that he’d be coming back to Iowa. He said it wasn’t a tough decision at all.

It has helped that his mom moved to Iowa City - from St. Louis, where Clayborn grew up - in April. She provides a local home despite his being away at college, and he’s leaning on her to handle the agents that have been showing interest, freeing him up to focus on his final collegiate season.

Despite the nationally-recognized on-field success Clayborn had last season, he had a tumultuous go of things off the field.

Last spring, Clayborn got into an altercation with a cab driver that ended with him spending a night in jail on charges for assault causing bodily injury. As he described it, it was late at night, and a traffic jam left Clayborn and the cab driver both frustrated.

The driver honking at Clayborn wasn’t the thing that ignited the situation, though. His use of a racial slur was. Things turned ugly, allegedly resulting in Clayborn punching the driver.

“It’s a racial slur, but some people out there use the word,” said Clayborn. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to get it again, being on the stage that I am. Now that I know how to handle it, it’s a good thing. I regret doing it, but I wouldn’t take it back because I think that made me a better person."

The other incident left the 6-foot-4, 285 pounder flat-out scared. 

He found out a woman was stalking him, an obsession that lasted four or five months and culminated in her harassing Clayborn from the first row behind the Hawkeyes bench during the Arkansas State game.

“It was scary, dealing with that and not knowing what a person wants to do to you, as far as violence or anything,” Clayborn said. “It was scary. It wasn’t like a kind of fun deal, like ‘oh, I have a stalker.’ It was, ‘I have a stalker, I need to do something about it.’”

But now, with the stalker out of his life, the arrest behind him – he plead guilty this winter – and his mom living in Iowa City to help out, Clayborn can focus intently on his final season.

And that’s a scary thought for quarterbacks around the Big Ten.

Iowa quarterback leads with passion, heart

By Brian Heinemann
For The Herald

Ricky Stanzi blanked. He was nervous, and he didn’t know what to say.

So he blurted out the first thing that came to mind - “If you don’t love it, leave it. USA number one!” - and drew the attention of the nation to himself.

Those words at the FedEx Orange Bowl in January made Ricky Stanzi into somewhat of a legend and a YouTube sensation. He, for one, just finds it funny.

“I didn’t know what the question was about,” Stanzi said of what prompted his response. “Looking back on it, I know now. I just wasn’t smart enough to answer it, obviously. I couldn’t process it that fast. At the time, I was just all excited about the win, and trying to keep my composure. 

“And then he (Fox Sports’ Chris Myers) goes out and says ‘America,’ and I of course have that little trigger in my head, that I want to get a couple quotes out there and let everyone know how Iowa feels about being patriotic.”

Stanzi and his teammates use phrases like “if you don’t love it, leave it” and “these colors don’t run” around the house and the football complex, so it was nothing out of the ordinary for him to say what he said. Of course, this time there was a national audience watching and a microphone being held up to his face.

That’s the part that Stanzi finds hilarious. That, of everybody, he was the one that got to use one of those phrases on national television.

He gets a kick out of the pictures, too, the ones that have been Photoshopped, playing on his patriotism and “national hero” persona. 

“(They are) very interesting,” he said. “I saw some of them. My dad’s seen them. He would show them to me and my mom. They think it’s hilarious. They’re pretty funny. I just wonder how much time  these people have that they are putting into this stuff. But it’s funny. I’m glad people got a laugh out of it. It’s all in good fun.”

But not everything with Stanzi is fun and games. He is a real life hero, at least to some. Just looking at his wrists is a clear indicator of that.

On each wrist, the senior quarterback has four rubber bracelets. They have been given to him by seven different people - the first is so faded and worn out that he was given another - and they mean so much to him that never takes them off. 

Ever.

“They’re just bands for kids at the children's hospital, or in Iowa in general, who are battling certain diseases, and they’ll give you their band just to wear because they’re fans of the Hawkeyes,” Stanzi said.

Stanzi has met the children through hospital visits and from Dance Marathon in Iowa City and has developed close relationships with some of them and their families. To him, wearing a bracelet given to him by a child struggling with a life-threatening disease is the least he can do.

“You wear them for support, but at the same time, it kind of lets you know that what you’re doing is on a small scale, compared to the kind of battle they have to go through every single day,” he said. “If we’re able to help them in any way, we think that’s a tremendous opportunity. They’re only a walk away from the stadium, so if we have time and we can go over and visit, why not?”

Many of his teammates wear a band or two, but none like Stanzi. 

“I wear a couple, but not as much as that guy,” defensive end Adrian Clayborn said of the quarterback. “He likes his wristbands. They’re given to him by kids, so he wears them.”

His attitude and his heart have earned him the status as unquestioned leader of the Hawkeyes and as a permanent team captain. 

“Not only on the field, but off the field, he pushes us,” Clayborn said. “He pushes the defense in practice. He’s probably the best leader on our team."

And his play, while erratic at times, shows another quality of Stanzi’s that has earned him respect not just within his own team, but throughout the Big Ten.

“I have tremendous respect for Ricky Stanzi,” Michigan cornerback Troy Woolfolk said. “Even though people might call it crazy, I call it courage. He has it, and he’s not afraid to try to throw something in there.”

Hawkeyes gearing up for a fresh start

By Brian Heinemann

For The Herald

CHICAGO ----- Expectations are soaring for the Iowa Hawkeyes.

They have been consistently picked in the top 15 of the nation in preseason publications, and Monday the Big Ten announced the Hawkeyes were selected No. 2 in the conference behind Ohio State.

But just like last year, when the Hawkeyes did a remarkable job of staying grounded and keeping a narrow focus, the team isn’t letting the hype get to them.

“As you know, we barely got through that first weekend a year ago,” Ferentz said. “That’s all we’ve got to do, just look back at that one game, or probably a handful of games last year, and just realize how fine a line it is. At the end of the day, talk and expectations and all that stuff is for people outside our building. We need to be focused on getting better as a football team.”

When looking at the last time the Hawkeyes took the field, a 24-14 win over a formerly-explosive-turned-whimpering offensive juggernaut in Georgia Tech in the Orange Bowl, it’s hard to imagine how they could get better. 

But this is a new year, with new players. Sure, many of the standouts are back, but as Ferentz or his players will be quick to tell you, last year doesn’t mean much anymore.

“Honestly, if you look ahead, you’re not going to take care of the business that you have right in front of you,” defensive tackle Karl Klug said. “You have to take one week at a time. As soon as you look ahead, or look behind you at last year’s season, I feel like you will get complacent. 

“Last year is irrelevant right now. We’re just looking to beat Eastern Illinois.”

While that match-up doesn’t look particularly daunting on paper, Iowa showed last year that they have the unfortunate tendency to play down to their opponents. A large part of the problem was inconsistency at the quarterback position, something starter Ricky Stanzi is well aware of.

Last year, Stanzi threw 15 interceptions to go along with his 17 touchdowns. For nearly as often as he was really good, he was frustratingly bad.

He’s seen things in film from last year that he believes he can correct, which would go a long way toward continuing the success of the 2009 season. He knows that not all shots need to be taken, and that he could and sometimes should check down and throw underneath more frequently. He knows that he doesn’t need to force passes to his receiver, trying to fit them into tight windows to make the big play.

He knows he needs to be better. More consistent.

“I want to be more accountable, in a sense that I’m not going to put our team in a bad position with turnovers,” Stanzi said. “That’s really the main focus. I don’t want to put our team in a bad spot. I don’t want to make our defense have to put a goal line stand up for no reason because of a careless mistake.”

Iowa was able to overcome Stanzi’s mistakes last year, winning every game he played from start to finish. He’s a proven winner, 18-4 as a starter, including the big Orange Bowl triumph.

The two losses, though. The what-ifs. As much as both the coach and his players say that last year won’t matter once the ball is kicked off Sept. 4, they still feel those in some way and can learn from them.

“Losses stay with you,” Ferentz said. “You can’t let them affect you in a negative way during the season. But you’d be foolish to let them go, too.”

A few teams from around the Big Ten certainly haven’t forgotten some tough losses. Penn State, for one.

“Any time you go into a game like that where a team’s beat you the past couple of years, and you really want to get that win and the payback, it’s going to give you more motivation that whole week leading up to the game,” Evan Royster, Penn State’s starting running back, said of his team’s trip to Kinnick on Oct. 2. “They’re a really tough team to prepare for and to play against, but we’ll see how it goes this year.”

The teams that upended Iowa know that the Hawkeyes will be gunning for them this year, too, looking for some payback of their own.

“Iowa’s such a good team, and you always try to play your best against the best teams,” Dan Persa, Northwestern’s starting quarterback, said. “The past couple of years, we’ve been lucky to play our best and come out on top of the games. I know they’re probably not too happy about it, and I’m sure they’re going to come hunting for us this year.”

With a seemingly favorable schedule - Iowa gets Penn State, Wisconsin, Michigan State and Ohio State at home - and 16 returning starters, there is plenty of reason for optimism for the Hawkeyes, who should open the season ranked in or near the Top 10. 

“Everybody’s is feeling pretty good and optimistic about the season,” Ferentz said. “Last year’s team handled it well. That’s a matter of record. 

“Now the challenge is, what can this team do?”