Column: Can Weber lead Illini to success in the future?

By Majesh Abraham

While it is probably a decision that Illinois fans would scoff at, Kansas recently gave head coach Bill Self a five-year extension and a raise to go along with it.

It’s been three seasons since Self left the University of Illinois in a domino effect of coaching changes that redefined the powers of college basketball. It was after the ’02-’03 season that Roy Williams made that fateful decision to leave his beloved Kansas Jayhawks for his dream job in North Carolina.

That decision led to Self’s hiring at Kansas and Bruce Weber leaving Southern Illinois to join the Fighting Illini. In the three years since, each coach has had the chance to make his impact on their program – and they can truly call each program their own now.

Of course, Williams probably gets the nod for the most profound impact on his new team, leading the Tar Heels to the national championship in ’04-’05. It is truly coincidental that his opponent in the national championship game was Bruce Weber and the Illini.

Statistically though, Weber has had a coaching run for the ages. Weber’s 89 wins in his first three years coaching are the most by a Big Ten coach ever in that span, and the second most in any three-year stretch by a Big Ten coach.

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At almost eighty-five percent, he owns the best winning percentage in Big Ten history. Nobody will ever forget that memorable ’04-’05 season, when the Illini won 29 straight games on the way to a historical 37-2 season.

Of course, Weber was coaching players that Self recruited in those first two years, nobody will question that it was Weber’s coaching that led to the Illini’s success in those years.

Self, on the other hand, has had an inferior run with the Jayhawks. He inherited a highly touted veteran group of players from Williams, with guys like Wayne Simien and Aaron Miles. While the Jayhawks made the Elite Eight in Self’s first year, Kansas was upset in the first round of the NCAA tournament the last two years by mid-majors Bucknell and Bradley.

However, everyone knows Self’s forte is recruiting, and he hasn’t disappointed in that area. The Jayhawks have had three straight top-ten recruiting classes during Self’s tenure, including one that featured Julian Wright, a sophomore forward who was regarded as the best player out of Illinois in 2004.

Wright has led the No. 12 Jayhawks to a 5-2 record with an impressive victory over then-No. 1 Florida, but also to losses characteristic of Self’s career, to teams Kansas should easily beat in Oral Roberts and Depaul.

Williams, aided by the NCAA title, landed the top recruiting class in the country last year, and his young and talented group of Tar Heels are ranked 6th in the country and stocked with potential.

Which brings us to Weber, who has failed to land a top 25 class in his tenure, and lost the No. 2 prospect in the country to Indiana. The blame for the Eric Gordon fiasco can’t be put entirely on Weber, though. Some has to go to Hoosier head coach Kelvin Sampson for continuing to recruit a player who had already given his verbal commitment to another school.

Weber is a great coach, and I hope that he has a long and illustrious career here, but if he doesn’t step up his recruiting, the program is going to head downhill fast. The effects are already being seen this year, as the lack of a star player after the Deron/Dee era is immensely hurting the team.

The ’04-’05 season made Illini fans feel like they were watching one of the elite basketball programs in the country. Self and Williams have kept Kansas and UNC at that elite status; now the onus is on Weber to do the same.

Majesh Abraham is a junior in LAS. He can be reached at [email protected].