Illinois’ record when hitting the road to face a high-major non-conference foe isn’t pretty.
Here’s the hefty historical burden No. 11 Illinois (1-0) carries into Saturday afternoon’s visit to Duke (1-0): In 2023, the Bret Bielema-coached Illini lost at Kansas by 11. Two years before that, they got beaten by 28 at Virginia.
But the woes go back much further than the Bielema era.
In 2015, Tim Beckman’s bunch lost by 34 at North Carolina. The year before that, they took a 25-point whipping at Washington. And don’t forget the 45-14 defeat in 2012 at Arizona State. Even Ron Zook contributed to this streak with a 49-36 loss in 2009 at fifth-ranked Cincinnati.
You need to rewind the calendar back to Sept. 15, 2007, to find a road win against a power-conference non-league opponent: Illinois’ 41-20 victory at Syracuse. That Zook team went on to play in the Rose Bowl.
This Illinois squad has similar dreams of postseason grandeur — and a win over a Duke crew that has won 17 of its last 20 games at home would go a decent way to making the Illini real.
“I’m really excited to get out there and play a good team on the road and really see exactly what we’ve got from our guys,” Bielema said.
Neither Illinois nor Duke was truly tested in Week 1 by its FCS opponents. The Illini built a 31-0 halftime lead on the way to a 52-3 win over Western Illinois while the Blue Devils shrugged off a 10-10 halftime knot to wallop Elon 45-17.
“Offensively, we started slow. That seemed to be the theme of the (college football) weekend,” said Duke second-year coach Manny Diaz. “A little uptight, maybe?
Getting some timing down. And then we felt like we got into a rhythm. The way we played in the second half gave us a lot of confidence going forward.”
The Elon game served as Darian Mensah’s Duke debut — and his performance suggested his multimillion-dollar NIL payday was well-deserved. The Tulane transfer drilled 27 of 34 passes for 389 yards and three scores.
“I started watching his film from Tulane, right?” Bielema said. “Extremely gifted. Athletic. Smooth. Reads things extremely well. Has the ability to escape. I wouldn’t classify him as a runner, but he has the ability to escape and make things happen with his feet.”
That describes Illinois senior quarterback Luke Altmyer, too, though he didn’t need to do any running against Western Illinois as he threw for 217 yards and three scores in just 21 attempts. It helped that Altmyer and nearly all of the other contributors on the offensive side of the ball — save a few transfer portal receivers and tight ends — have been together for two or three years.
Diaz, who served as Penn State’s defensive coordinator before coming to Duke after the 2023 season, almost had to do a double take while watching the tape.
“It’s just weird to have played against them two years ago and to be able to remember a lot of those same guys that you were standing across the field against,” Diaz said.
He credits Bielema for that.
“Criminally underrated, in my opinion, for what he’s done with the three programs he’s been at,” Diaz said. “Having played Illinois my last year at Penn State, so many of their players that were in that game are still playing for them today. His ability to keep continuity, both on his coaching staff and on the roster, shows you that internally something is happening right there.”
