Illinois football makes 20-year history under Bret Bielema — and it's not on the field

Zain Bando

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Illinois football makes 20-year history under Bret Bielema — and it's not on the field image

© Ron Johnson-Imagn Images

It was a great Wednesday on the recruiting trail in Champaign, but it started with the end of a 20-year drought.

During this stretch for the Illinois football program, selling season tickets was like a chore.

Now, it's the standard.

Just after the clock turned noon, it happened.

 

According to a press release from the Illinois athletic department, the fans had done their job: all seven home games, including key Big Ten matchups against Ohio State and USC, sold out.

"Illinois has sold over 34,000 public season tickets, which excludes students and premium seating numbers," a portion of the release stated. "The Fighting Illini's final season ticket total for kickoff against Western Illinois on Friday, Aug. 29, is expected to exceed 43,000."

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This feat has echoed coach Bret Bielema's recent comments about maintaining a winning program for years to come. The past is what it is, and Bielema wants to keep it that way.

“I really do care what’s happened in the past [here] — but I don’t care,” Bielema said. “I am very respectful of everything that's been built to come here, but I also think we’ve been weighted down by the past.”

The same can be said for recruiting. After the Illini landed three players, two of whom came in the form of four-star dual-sport athlete Nasir Rankin from Morgan Park High School in Chicago, Ill., and three-star defensive end King Liggins from Brother Rice High School, the 2026 recruiting rankings reflect that success.

Sixteen pledges have the Illini ranked No. 8 in the 247Sports Composite Rankings. They may not be done yet, either.

With 100 days until Illinois welcomes Western Illinois to Champaign, the anticipation for a potentially historic season can no longer be ignored.

To many, it's the beginning of a new normal. Not just in the Big Ten, but nationally.

Zain Bando

Zain Bando is a freelance writer for The Sporting News. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism. Over the years, Bando has written about various beats surrounding Illinois, Northwestern, and Kansas State Athletics but sticks to the Big Ten as his primary expertise. Outside of collegiate reporting, Bando covers MMA and boxing for MMA Knockout On Sports Illustrated and hosts/co-hosts two podcasts as part of the Empty The Bench Podcast Network – Bando's Breakdowns and The MMA Outsiders, which air weekly on YouTube and are distributed on all podcast platforms Tuesday nights and Wednesday afternoons. Bando is a Chicago Suburban native and a member of the FWAA and USBWA, continuing to hone his professional skills as a sports journalist and media personality. Since June 2019, Bando's byline has been seen across many mediums, including MSN, Yardbarker, Deadspin, FanSided, BJPenn.com, Bridge Media Network (Sports News Highlights), Mike Farrell Sports, Reuters, and more. When Bando is not writing, he binges on old UFC fights, spends time with family and friends, memorizes every Super Bowl, and manifests all the places he still has to travel to (even while bringing his laptop).